PIANC Panama - Agenda

Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) is part of the critical infrastructure necessary for the safety and efficiency of vessel movements, especially in risky or congested areas. GNSS (especially GPS) has become the primary PNT source for maritime and inland waterways navigation. The GNSS position is used both for vessel navigation and as the position source for AIS.

The IMO e-Navigation concept supports the development of resilient positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) information. It is acknowledged that a number of technically dissimilar systems are required to ensure resilient PNT. The combined use of PVT relevant sensors (e.g. GNSS Receiver, DGNSS corrections, Multi-Radionavigation Receiver) and on-board systems (e.g. Radar, Gyro, etc.) could establish the required redundancy to enable the monitoring of data and system integrity and to improve the performance of provided PNT data. This enables the protection of the on-board process of PNT data generation (cybersecurity) against intrusions by malicious actors.

Unfortunately the mainly used GNSS is vulnerable to jamming and interference, intentional or not, which can lead to the loss of positioning information or, even worse, to incorrect positioning information. One potential source of resilient PNT services is the use of terrestrial backup systems (e.g. eLoran or R-Mode), using signals independent of GNSS. The concept of R-Mode, or ranging mode, was introduced to the IALA ENAV Committee many years ago, it is a novel way of using existing maritime radio systems (MF radio beacon as well as AIS) to provide GNSS independent PNT. R-Mode has the capability to support resilient PNT by providing terrestrial positioning in coastal waters or along inland waterways. First developments of this system concept were conducted in a feasibility study as well as a practical field demonstration within a transnational EU project named ACCSEAS (Accessibility for Shipping, Efficiency, Advantages and Sustainability) which ended in February 2015. A following up project (R-Mode Baltic) has just started (10/2017) to provide a large transnational testbed for dynamic tests and to further develop the R-Mode technology towards an operational system.

The paper will present an overview of recent developments in the field of radio navigation systems to be used in maritime and inland waterways. Thus systems comprise existing and emerging GNSS, the various options of using GNSS differential corrections (e.g. IALA beacon, SBAS or AIS/VDES) as well as terrestrial radio navigation systems (like R-Mode). In addition, the paper will contain a brief description about newest developments regarding Resilient PNT concepts from IMO and IALA, based on latest published performance standards (multi- system radionavigation receiver, and associated PNT data processing guidelines).