History of CARPI conferences

CARPI - the International Conference on Applied Robotics for the Power Industry, is an international conference created and initially hosted by Hydro-Quebec in Montreal, Canada, in 2010. The conference was managed as a non-profit undertaking and its content was planned mainly by Hydro-Quebec. CARPI 2010 was a three-day event that bring together stakeholders who are interested in robotics applications in the power industry. The program included presentations of robotics solutions for construction, refurbishment, inspection and maintenance of power systems. R&D decision makers and robotics developers had a chance to meet in a forum that allowed them to share high-value solutions. The conference draws 180 people from major organizations coming from 22 countries. The CARPI conference was created as a new and original forum with a specific and unique scope, i.e. bringing together two specific communities: robotics solution developers and power industry end-users. The need for such forum emanated from the observation that each community did not typically assemble together since each have their own well established but dedicated forums. In that regard, the relevance of the conference is driven by the presentation of original work presenting robotics development applied to the power industry. To remain relevant, the conference should bring a balanced number of participants of developers (universities, research centers, industrials) and end users (utilities - power generation, transmission and distribution). CARPI Conferences take place every 2 years, in a cosmopolitan city in different geographical regions of the world. So far, conferences were held in 2010, 2012, and 2014.