Investigation of MW imaging capabilities for the estimation of truckload

Freight transportation service by truck is an extremely growing market all over the world. However, the road traffic infrastructure in most countries is overloaded and is not growing in an appropriate manner. Hence there is a strong demand to optimize the cargo capacity of trucks in order to reduce truck traffic on the roads. Many freight transportation companies are loading their trucks in daily business not always with focus on efficient volume utilization. Often the loading is just done by individual experience of a forklift operator, or other operational constraints lead to a certain amount of only partially filled trucks. Hence there is an interest to estimate the actual volume distribution of truckload by a fast and stand-off monitoring sensor under common driving conditions. Microwave (MW) imaging sensors like radars and radiometers can provide a significant benefit for this task due to the high penetration capability of microwaves through thin dielectric walls, e.g. the tarpaulin of a truck's loading platform. This paper describes the investigation of MW radar and radiometer techniques for the estimation of truckload under experimental conditions. Imaging results for both techniques are presented and discussed.