Structural Monitoring (SM) is widely recognized as the basis for any sort of diagnostics in assessing the operating conditions of structures and infrastructures. Through the continuous technological development of data collection and processing tools, SM allows one to evaluate the structural characteristics and the level of damage of any structural system, giving the technicians the ability to predict the structural response deterioration along time.
In principle, attention is focused on the possibility of rapidly acquiring data from different instruments in a nearly simultaneous way, the target being the realization of a reliable control map. Care is devoted to those emerging technologies capable of monitoring the structure remotely and without contact.
Monitoring the health status of a structure (SHM) means to generate the potential for increasing its level of safety in its various life stages. By monitoring an existing facility, by carrying out surveys and tests, one obtains a sequence of structural responses to external excitations. Comparing one with the other, one can detect damage-induced modifications of the response. Within the GEOFIT project, the source of the potential damage to be detected is related to the drilling activity necessary for the installation of the designed geothermal plant.
