How an army of sewer robots can help us fix our clogged pipes

Hidden from sight, under the UK’s roads, buildings, and parks, lie about one million kilometers of pipes. Maintaining and repairing these pipes require about 1.5 million road excavations a year, which causes either full or partial road closures. These works are noisy, dirty and cause a lot of inconveniences. They also cost around £5.5 billion a year. It doesn’t have to be this way. Research teams like mine are working on a way of reducing the time and money that goes into main