Everything You Need to Know About Drone Inspection

How drones are used in inspections?

Nowadays, many industries benefit from UAV inspections. Below, we will describe how different industries use UAVs for inspections, the benefits drones provide, and more.

Agriculture drone inspections

Drones are destined to become a valuable tools for farmers because they can diagnose and observe the state of crops in real time over very large areas without causing damage to the soil or stationary crops.

Agricultural drones not only allow visual inspection of the land to identify weed or pest damage. It is also equipped with a variety of sensors that facilitate the analysis of a range of data: nitrogen levels, chlorophyll, biomass, humidity, water stress, etc. In addition, the low altitude and high resolution of the drones make it possible to collect aerial views that are more relevant than satellite images, whether for viticulture and arboriculture or market gardening, horticulture, and major cereal crops.

Thanks to all this information, farmers can precisely adjust the level of fertilizer or other pesticides to be applied, as well as the area in question. For farmers who regularly use drones, we have noticed a significant reduction in the amount of liquid used to treat the crop, thus promoting sustainable and rational agriculture. Yields have also improved, and even though the acquisition costs of the most advanced drones amount to several thousand euros, the return on investment is relatively quick.

Chemicals drone inspections

The rise of industrial drone inspections in the chemical industry has helped plant operators monitor critical infrastructure, providing high-quality reporting data while improving safety and additional economic benefits.

Drones are increasingly being used by chemical processing companies to monitor assets, gas leaks, or emissions outdoors because of their ability to reach elevated platforms. Dow Chemical, for example, is using drones to inspect flares, distillation towers, and pipelines at its facilities. Equipped with high-resolution cameras and sensors, these drones can accurately assess conditions and identify temperature anomalies in flare stacks.

In addition to outdoor monitoring, drones can enter hazardous confined spaces such as tanks, cables, stirrers, reactors, or pressure vessels to inspect for leaks or cracks, identify signs of rust and corrosion, and locate dropped or unwanted items within the asset.

Construction drone inspections

Construction companies have been using drone inspections for some time now to help quickly gather aerial data on the status of the entire site and to understand and monitor project progress.

Construction companies use drones for 3 main reasons.

• Real-time monitoring: The drone and its camera are remotely connected to a device that shows you a record of that moment. It shows us the whole traceability of the work and the environmental impact study.

• Inspecting a specific point: The size and mobility of the drone are perfect for areas that are large and difficult to access or where visual inspection is time-consuming and dangerous, such as cranes, towers, bridges, roads, and railroads.

• Show your customers the results of your engineering work: a bird's eye view of the results is more attractive and pleasing to the eye of those interested in engineering.

The future use of drones is destined to monitor large buildings and very complex sites. They offer all the perspective and the space, time, and cost savings that come with this type of work. This, along with the use of BIM and new construction materials, will ensure the efficiency of future buildings. The use of a drone in construction can reduce the total cost of work by an average of 25%, and the data they capture using laser sensors is analyzed and used in every phase of the work project.

Infrastructure and utility drone inspections

Infrastructure is inspected with drones because maintenance and repair of these structures is often a laborious task, depending on the extent of damage, the size of the infrastructure itself, or the difficulty of accessing a particular area. Thanks to drones, more and more companies are seeking to speed up the maintenance and repair of infrastructure, reducing execution time, risk and cost.

A variety of industries are currently using or intend to use drone inspection technology for monitoring, inspection, and maintenance, including.

• Oil and gas: pipeline leak detection, industrial storage tanks
• Industrial: ship and aircraft manufacturing
• Energy: wind turbine blades, power transmission lines, topside marine infrastructure
• Construction: inspections of cranes, towers, bridges, roads, and railroads

In recent years, drone technology has advanced by leaps and bounds, increasing its autonomy, agility, and resistance, making it possible to use it for a myriad of tasks. Drones record accurate data in real-time and transmit it live to technical teams, allowing any infrastructure to be analyzed in the field.

Insurance drone inspections

Drones for insurance inspections are not only making the job faster and easier, helping insurers improve claims adjudication and claims processing and reduce operational costs.

Here are the main ways drones are used for insurance inspections:

• Roof inspection. Roof damage is one of the most difficult types of damage to inspecting. Climbing on the roof is only half the battle - then you must stay on the roof and inspect it thoroughly while keeping an eye on your safety. With drones, you can skip the ladders and handheld cameras. Simply fly the drone remotely to take detailed photos and video, and you can easily inspect roof damage.
• Home inspection. Today, many home inspection services have drones. Drones can reach hard-to-reach places, such as steep roofs and chimney tops, to help you spot potential cracks, wear and tear, and other damage that may not be easily visible to the naked eye.
• Property insurance inspections. Drones make inspecting large commercial properties fast and easy. They help adjusters and underwriters get information faster, reducing claim processing time from days to hours. This will greatly increase customer satisfaction. In addition, drones provide detailed, consistent, and high-resolution images that improve the quality of the claims adjudication process.
• Natural disaster inspections. When disasters like wildfires or earthquakes occur, insurers are trusted to assess damage to properly pay for damaged homes and businesses. Drones help insurers get more accurate payouts and allow insurers to stay in a safe area during inspections.

Power generation drone inspections

Power companies consist of many different buildings, equipment, and pipelines that require regular inspections to function properly.

Here are the main ways drones are used for power generation management:

• Boilers and storage tanks. Industrial drone inspections of boilers, fuel storage tanks, and confined spaces in power plants, refineries, and other industrial plants are becoming commonplace. Drones are equipped with powerful LED lights that ensure good image quality with true, natural colors, allowing you to quickly get details of specific sections.
• Building and roof inspections. Still, images and video recordings taken by drones are useful in inspecting buildings, roofs, and gutters, helping inspectors locate hazards quickly. To detect heat-related faults or defect inspections, you can also attach a thermal imaging camera to the drone, which can quickly identify potential leaks.
• Leak inspection of heating pipes. A drone with a thermal camera can locate areas in a pipeline that may be malfunctioning and causing leaks, so the homeowner can make repairs and in turn, can avoid energy loss.

By flying around objects and using their cameras (and additional sensors), drones can capture data faster and more accurately than a human, and take photos or notes of a higher quality than a human. With no need for scaffolding, cranes, or rope access, you can save significant costs and work preparation time.

Mining drone inspections

The use of drones in mining is becoming more and more common as drones are becoming essential tools within the quarry and open pit business.

Drones allow visual monitoring of work being done in a mineral deposit. Specifically, drones can be used to monitor open-pit mines, stockpiles, tailings dams, and pipelines - as well as to assist with safety and emergency response tasks.

They can be used to estimate material quantities, understand current stockpiles, and detect elevations and landslide-prone areas that may make work difficult. They can also be used to monitor equipment such as crushers and conveyors, and survey job sites during construction.

The biggest benefit of using drones to inspect mines is the assurance of worker safety. Mines are often located in challenging environments with extreme temperatures and weather conditions. Drones are able to collect visual data remotely to ensure the safety of mining personnel.

Drones make mine inspections easier and more frequent, which also leads to safer conditions and minimization of risk. In addition, the timely and accurate information obtained by drones lets companies know exactly how much inventory is available, how many trucks are entering or leaving, and much more.

Finally, drones assist mining operators in detecting remaining ore and other areas where finding remnants can save mining companies money.

Oil and gas drone inspections

Maintenance and monitoring activities in the oil and gas industry must be performed regularly to avoid spills, production interruptions, and unplanned shutdowns. UAV inspections are an attractive addition to traditional facility management methods.

Here are the main ways drones are used in the oil and gas industries:

• Flare stack inspection. Drones can obtain detailed images of flare stack heads, eliminating the risk to personnel and allowing for uninterrupted production time. Avoiding production downtime can save you over $4 million. Drones can capture images in a very short period of time, making repairs and maintenance less expensive and time-consuming.
• Pipeline inspections. Oil and gas drones have become the most cost-effective type of platform for inspecting thousands of miles of oil and gas pipelines around the world. Using thermal imaging technology, temperature differences between fluids and the ground can be easily detected and oil and gas leaks can be found.
• Offshore oil rig inspections. Working offshore complicates the inspection of oil rigs and exposes workers to greater risk. Drones can send real-time information to operators on the platform while flying within a few meters of the offshore platform. High-definition videos and stills can be provided from all angles - essential information that can be used to assess and plan ahead for the work required.
• Tailings pond inspection. Using drones for this application makes it possible to gather information in hazardous environments, and extreme weather conditions should no longer be a barrier to conducting such inspections.
• Oil spill and oil spill detection. Drones are perfectly suited to avoid the huge damage that can be caused by oil spills. By using the right sensors, drones can be used to measure and quantify oil spills, with the ability to assess their location, how fast they are moving through the water, and the specific area it has reached. This real-time information can determine where to dispatch response vessels and recover the time previously spent on the damage detection process.
• Monitor gas emissions. The highly sensitive optical sensors provided by drones can help monitor gas emissions at critical sites and in large areas that are difficult to cover. They make drone surveillance, surveying, identifying, and repairing leaks a manageable task. With nearly half a million fracked gas wells in the United States, this task is essential. Drones help reduce the cost of performing such inspections and enable safe 3D mapping of drilling sites, natural gas pipelines, landfills, and other municipal operations.

Public safety drone inspections

The use of drones in public safety has grown rapidly in recent years. Increasingly, governments are using drones to protect the public from harmful and unanticipated hazards. Some of the inspection scenarios in which drones are used for public safety are live, ongoing activities such as locating missing persons during search and rescue operations, capturing aerial intelligence during an active shooter scenario, or understanding the spread of a wildfire in real-time.

Here are the main ways drones are used for public safety:

• Search and rescue. In search and rescue operations, time is of the essence. Night vision drones can quickly cover large areas and can use thermal imaging technology for nighttime searches.
• Traffic collision reconstruction. In traffic management, the combination of drones and 3D mapping software allows investigators to quickly and efficiently create 3D renderings of actual crash scenes.
• Active shooter investigations. Drones allow officers to examine armed and dangerous people from a safe distance. This provides officers with real-time, actionable intelligence to assess threats while developing strategies for their approach.
• Crime scene analysis. Investigators can use drones to take videos and photos to see the actual crime scene accurately.
• Crowd monitoring. Law enforcement officers can use a police drone to conduct investigations from a distance, keeping them safe from detection while monitoring an area for extended periods of time.
• Hazardous material spill. Drones can be used to assess hazmat spills, determine the perimeter of a spill, and help determine safe entry and exit points for hazmat teams.