Secretary for the Civil Service Ingrid Yeung called on the Environmental Protection Department today to learn more about its environmental quality monitoring work and its application of innovative technologies.
To begin her visit, Mrs Yeung met Director of Environmental Protection Samuel Chui and directorate staff and was briefed on developments in various area of the department’s work.
In recent years, it has introduced or developed a variety of innovative technological devices in its operations. One of these is the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Environmental Air Nuisance Investigation Robot Dog, known as “AI Dog”.
Unlike traditional methods that rely on the experience and sense of smell of investigators, the AI Dog enhances accuracy and efficiency through continuous machine learning. Now on trial in various district, it identifies and locates sources of pollution by using Internet of Things technology to search data on the Hong Kong Air Pollutant Emission Inventory.
The department’s Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), meanwhile, enables it to track leakage in underground sewage pipes without digging up roads.
The department’s staff gave Mrs Yeung demonstrations of both the AI Dog and GPR in operation.
At the department’s Smart Command and Control Centre, Mrs Yeung received a briefing on the use of an Unmanned Submarine instead of divers to conduct monitoring and sampling in the Shing Mun River via remote control and real-time images.
Staff also introduced her to the Mesh Network Sampling Robot Squad, which conducts quality sampling and investigations in remote or dangerous areas in a more efficient manner.
Mrs Yeung said the department’s AI Dog and AI Unmanned Submarine can be viewed as AI civil servants as they improve work efficiency and enable better follow-up solutions to pollution problems that were difficult to handle in the past. She said that resolving problems in a shorter time gives the public a greater sense of satisfaction.
The civil service chief highlighted that the 2025-26 Budget reinforced the Government’s fiscal consolidation programme. Bureaus and departments are required to further review their resource allocations and work priorities, and provide public services in a more cost-effective manner through streamlining procedures.
She encouraged all departments to step up their efforts to apply technology in their work to enhance efficiency and manpower utilisation.
Before concluding her visit, Mrs Yeung met staff representatives of various grades in the department.
