AI USE CASE
Real-Time PPE Compliance Detection
Automatically detect missing protective equipment on construction sites using live camera feeds.
What it is
Computer vision models analyse CCTV and site camera streams in real-time to flag workers not wearing required PPE such as helmets, vests, or goggles. Alerts are pushed instantly to site supervisors, reducing compliance violations by 60–80% compared to manual spot-checks. Early deployments typically cut recordable safety incidents by 20–35% within the first six months. The system also generates audit-ready compliance logs, reducing time spent on safety reporting by several hours per week.
Data you need
Existing CCTV or IP camera infrastructure covering work zones, plus a labelled dataset of workers with and without PPE for model training or fine-tuning.
Required systems
- none
Why it works
- Conduct a thorough camera coverage audit before deployment to eliminate blind spots.
- Involve site safety officers in validating alert thresholds and PPE class definitions.
- Establish a retraining pipeline triggered whenever new PPE types are introduced.
- Integrate alerts into an existing communication channel (e.g. site radio, mobile app) to ensure rapid response.
How this goes wrong
- Poor lighting or camera angles on site create too many false negatives, undermining trust in the system.
- Workers learn to game alerts near cameras while ignoring PPE elsewhere on site.
- Model accuracy degrades when PPE types or colours change without retraining the model.
- Alert fatigue among supervisors if false positive rates are not tuned down before go-live.
When NOT to do this
Do not deploy this system as the sole enforcement mechanism on a site where camera coverage is sparse or where workers routinely operate in poorly lit or confined spaces, it will miss too many violations to be relied upon.
Vendors to consider
Sources
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