Since the year 2000, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration’s (PHMSA) Significant Pipeline Incidents report shows that the industry is struggling to create a consistent year-to-year reduction in fatalities and injuries. In 2019 alone, over 12 lives were lost and 35 people were seriously injured in pipeline incidents.1 Sometimes, looking at figures like this, […]
Photogrammetry – the art of turning remotely sensed data sets into comprehensive models of the earth’s surface and terrain. With the introduction and gradual evolution of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technology, the high-resolution orthomosaics and Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) this process yields are becoming more accessible and higher in quality. With UAV-sourced imagery, you can […]
If you work in the field of pipeline integrity management, you’re likely finding yourself playing an ever-more difficult game. With aging infrastructure and ever-increasing regulatory burdens, you may be in search of a way to better monitor and mitigate issues along your pipeline and right-of-way (ROW). Platforms for aerial data can provide a new layer […]
In last week’s article on UAVs for Border Patrol, we discussed how re-thinking UAV deployment with smaller, lower-cost aerial systems can greatly improve a border patrol agency’s ability to visually monitor their border from the skies. This week, we’re examining how situating this UAV technology in a greater workflow for aerial data, that incorporates AI […]
Recent evolutions in commercially-available Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have made them better data sourcing and agent support tools than ever before. On the regular, agents find themselves working solo in remote locations, far from any boots-on-the-ground assistance. It’s not uncommon for a single agent to be seizing massive drug shipments or arresting dozens of people […]
New workflows for aerial data stand to revolutionize the way you monitor and manage your remote mining operations. Autonomous technologies can handle the majority of the process on your behalf, including Artificial Intelligence (AI) for data analysis and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) for data sourcing. With the resultant actionable data, your remote managers and on-site […]
First ones in, last ones out. On the daily, first responders across the spectrum of emergency services find themselves at the intersection of rapid response and critical decision-making. Better data can drive better outcomes, and improving the tactical awareness that first responders operate with enables them to save lives and maintain safety. Drones, otherwise known […]
Electricity. As a society, we just can’t seem to get enough of it. While debates rage on about how best to generate it – hydro, nuclear, wind, solar, Dyson sphere – the way of transporting it remains tried and true. Every day, power grid networks of high-voltage transmission lines deliver the power we need to […]
If you reduce an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) to its absolute core function, it boils down to delivery. While most think of packages from Amazon, in the geospatial world, this takes the form of sensor delivery. A UAV takes a sensor where you need it to collect data. Like a flow rate sensor in an […]
Pipeline corrosion is an unstoppable force, albeit a slow-moving one at times. Corrosion accounts for nearly 10% of all significant pipeline incidents over the past 20 years, according to PHMSA, putting it among the top contributors to leaks. Furthermore, corrosion-related costs to monitor, replace, and maintain assets is approximately $5.8 billion annually 1. Implementing a […]