Chevron recently shared that because of the performance of Boston Dynamics’ robot dogs, named Spot, at its El Segundo Refinery in California has been going well, so well its expanding its agreement into other parts of California, as well as Texas and Mississippi.

In Chevron’s news release, Trey Calor, Robotics Manager for Chevron’s Technical Center states, “We’re trying to change the whole mindset of how robotics and Chevron coexist. They’re not toys. They’re tools, and they’re another way that helps us to safely and efficiently run our operations.”

Initially introduced to the refinery in 2022, Chevron has been pleased with how dynamic and adaptive the robots are at helping to discover inefficiencies and improve fleet performance, too.

This is a novel way of introducing robotics into industrial spaces, leveraging real-time environmental sensing and data collection to curb potential issues, monitor refinery activity, and “nudge” workers into making better decisions.

As the cost of parts come down, the advancements in technologies and data collection and processing improve, companies like Chevron are better able to integrate what used to be far-fetched ideas like using robotic dogs in industrial spaces to enhance performance and expand their capabilities.

It will be interesting to see if other refineries decide to integrate robots into their facilities over the next few years.