Search News

From enhancing safety to optimizing operational efficiency, drones and robotics are reshaping traditional practices in the energy industry and opening up new horizons for exploration and production. 

Drones have become increasingly impactful in the construction industry, offering a range of benefits that improve efficiency, safety, and cost-effectiveness.

Native American tribes in Oklahoma have poured more than $15.6 billion into the state, while generating billions more from companies that support the tribes' business operations, according to the most recent Oklahoma Native Impact report (fiscal year 2019). The report illustrates how Oklahoma's 38 federally recognized tribes have made an unprecedented impact on the Sooner State's economy through a diverse portfolio of businesses including gaming and hospitality, manufacturing, real estate, retail and professional services, UAS/AAM, among others.

Innovative entrepreneurs continue to come up with new ways in which drones can be used to perform a wide range of jobs that had previously required human workers, more efficiently, at a lower cost and more safely, than was previously possible.

AeroX, a nonprofit organization focused on promoting the safe and efficient commercialization of UAS technologies in Forsyth County, has been awarded a $5 million dollar grant from the North Carolina General Assembly for the design and development of an urban advanced air mobility system in Winston-Salem and Forsyth County, North Carolina.

In this immersive webinar from Teledyne FLIR, product manager Kelly Brodbeck will explain how the combination of optical thermal zoom and radiometry enable more efficient search and surveillance, safer inspection, and better reporting for drone pilots.

Autonomous charging solutions company WiBotic has launched its Commander drone and robot fleet energy management software for companies with large fleets. The software package allows the charging state of all drones in the fleet to be managed and monitored.

A U.S. drone survey startup has opened an office in Sudbury to better serve mining operations in Northern Ontario and across Canada.

While it has had devastating effects on other business sectors, Pendleton's unmanned aerial systems industry wasn't grounded.
Darryl Abling, the city's range manager, said operations never really slowed down during the pandemic as social distancing didn't really prevent UAS companies from running test flights.

"THE drone revolution is happening right now, " declared Poladrone founder and chief executive officer Cheong Jin Xi.
"Many industries are realising that modern drones, which excel at precision automation and efficient data collection, are able to simplify many dirty, dangerous and difficult tasks."

Within part of a former Quaker Oats milling facility on Amnicola Highway, one of the nation's biggest logistics companies is testing out futuristic ways to ship, store and distribute all manner of goods.

VP Racing Fuels, a company that has been fueling champions in virtually every form of motorsport on land, sea, and air with its fuel technology since 1975, has for more than 10 years now been indirectly working with UAVs

As industry and society in general come back on line after months of interruption due to the threat of COVID- 19, Garrett Scott, UAS coordinator for Duke Energy, said he believes "a lot of the things we're seeing right now, whether because of social distancing or the financial [aspect], are going to be around for quite a while after we move out of this mandated period."

A German-based drone manufacturer purchased several soldering systems recently to help its workers manually assemble electronic modules for the company's quadrocopter, providing a reliable connection for varying individual payloads.

The unmanned industry, like nearly every sector, suffered from the economic and operational effects of the social distancing and a global shutdown from the pandemic. But like in many innovative industries, some UAS companies quickly adapted to the new situation and succeeded in turning the situation around and leverage it

While we're preparing to launch a six-wheeled robotic rover roughly the size of a car to explore Mars, future planetary exploration and science missions could employ much smaller hardware — including, potentially, swarms of robots the size of insects designed to act in concert with one another autonomously.

The power industry was an early adopter of drone technology, but in this insider piece Andre Louis-Ferdinand says that the sector continues to find new applications and new uses for drones – especially in these challenging times.

In November 2019, S&T's National Urban Security Technology Laboratory assessed small, commercially available drones for priority needs of first responders through its First Responder Robotic Operations System Test  program. The feedback will be documented in a final assessment report and shared nationally with the first responder community.

Drones have been used in the power industry for a few years now, but in the U.S., power line stringing is a relatively new application.

Fishermen have always relied on the understanding of the elements to guide them: the water current, its temperature, the direction of the wind and its humidity are important information used to locate fish. Now, drones are bringing some fishfinding technology back above the water.

Remote ID has been a charged topic in the industry.  While some stakeholders feel that the proposed rule must be completely reworked, others have taken the more hopeful view that the rule is a good start towards a workable solution.

Black Swift Technologies (BST) has introduced its American-made, advanced UAS called the Black Swift E2, which is designed for automated industrial and structural inspections.

Beyond their surveillance capabilities, drones can support inspection and asset management inside the manufacturing plant.

Flirtey announced today it has begun routine drone delivery demonstrations in a designated area inside the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center (TRI Center), located in Nevada. The demonstrations are in preparation for routine food delivery trials to designated points on the TRI Center park.

Drone stocks are massive opportunities for companies and investors alike. Companies across the US have rushed to deploy drones to cut costs, boost operational efficiency, and open up new streams of revenue. 

On-the-fly solutions by Duke Energy and Southern Company helped repair storm-damaged transmission lines, spurring innovation and expansion at two major power companies.

There are many terrific benefits of drones across multiple sectors.  Every week, we read about the new benefits of using UAVs for inspections.

A University of Kansas aerospace engineer has earned the National Science Foundation's most prestigious award for young faculty to design, build and fly a radar suite and integrate it on a helicopter-based unmanned aerial system to gather data on some of the world's most critical glaciers.

In our 2019 drone industry survey, we sought out to understand how the U.S. drone industry is doing — are pilots making money? What industries are they in? How often are they flying?

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a helicopter-shaped drone cruising over miles of Xcel Energy transmission lines.

New York Governer Andrew Cuomo recently visited Israel – and came back home having formed partnerships and agreements that will support the state in developing new industries, including drones.  New York's Empire State Development, the state's economic development agency, will offer a $250,000 planning grant to establish a new Unmanned Aerial Systems Research and Testing Center of Excellence.

It's been over a year since the UAS Integration Pilot Program (UAS IPP) winners were announced, and a lot has happened since then.

Microsoft has awarded a $100,000 TechSpark grant to support Airtonomy, a startup that's partnering with the University of North Dakota Aerospace Foundation to blaze a trail for drone applications in North Dakota's "Silidrone Valley."

The use of drones, in the oil and gas industry, is growing and the technology is ready to take off in a big way. It offers benefits to oil and gas operations in a numerous ways— safe and efficient maintenance and inspections among them—but the data that UAS technology provides is transforming the industry.

A new Utah group is hoping to clear a path for the state to become a leader in the wave of drone innovations that some believe will render other remarkable advancements like self-driving cars a moot point while turning the near-overhead airspace into a much busier place.

The spectrum of commercial UAS applications today is broad, ranging from product delivery and media coverage to precision mapping and worksite monitoring. The tool is ideal to monitor the status of construction progress or agriculture yield, explore and document remote or hazardous sites, provide accurate information in support of asset management systems, and verify safety issues and concerns at any location.

Attendees at this year's Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) Technology Forum in Broken Arrow, Okla., can expect to hear a wide-range of quality speakers, including a couple of nationally known and respected industry professionals.

Question: What looks like a bird, flies like a helicopter and sounds like a swarm of bees? Answer: A drone!

Amazon, UPS and others are exploring using drones to deliver packages to people's doorsteps, but some companies are thinking bigger — autonomous cargo drones the size of small airplanes.

Scientists have created the first nano drone capable of flying itself without a human operator, breaking ground on new ways to miniaturize artificial intelligence (AI) and limit processing power.

The state of Kansas is celebrating its Fourth Annual Aviation Day Event in Wichita. The annual event seeks to educate the public on the impact of the aviation industry while lobbying state officials for more favorable legislation to help expand the industry.

Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. (Nasdaq:KTOS), a leading National Security Solutions provider, announced today that it has recently received approximately $3.2 million in unmanned aerial drone and other system product orders.

Unmanned aerial systems—drones—have quickly found their place in the power sector. But as the industry moves out of test cases and experiments, and into full implementation of drones, it is facing a whole new set of challenges and opportunities. 

Flying a drone in confined locations isn't an easy task. It requires piloting skills, and previous knowledge of the surroundings. But what happens if you need to fly a drone where there is no GPS, no light, and humans can't go? A new drone certification program from Flyability will help provide Elios drone owners with a way to assess their piloting skills in these kinds of situations, but that's just the first step for organizations looking to adopt the technology.

California startup company FlightWave Aerospace Inc. has introduced its second unmanned aircraft system in less than a month—the fuel cell-powered Jupiter-H2.
The UAS features heavy-lifting capability and greater endurance because it uses a fuel cell rather than a battery to provide electric power.

Republican Congressman Jason Lewis (R-MN-02) led the legislation for the Drone Innovation Act, which looks to define operations of civil UAS under 200 feet and within state, local, or tribal jurisdictions.

Employers in all 50 states use drones for more than 40 business applications, according to research from AUVSI. Aerial photography is most common on a list that also includes construction; infrastructure; emergency management; and mining, oil and gas. And some safety experts have taken stock. New York-based Skanska first explored using drones – more formally known as unmanned aircraft systems, or UAS – several years ago, starting slowly as the technology developed. Before long, the organization had pinpointed numerous practical and cost-effective uses that also promoted worker safety.

Steve Kyes owns roughly 2,800 acres of farmland north of here, mostly corn and soybean fields. With the help of his stepson, Andrew Luebbe, and a hired employee, Kyes, 44, and his crew have focused on increasing their profits. Inside Kyes' farm office sits an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) — commonly known as a drone — with the potential to make his operation more efficient and, maybe someday, more profitable. Across the country, farmers like Kyes are taking to the sky in hopes of improving production and quality on the ground. As always, there's a cost-benefit equation: The bill for a drone and accessories can fly past $1,500, not counting specialized cameras or other gear.

A new venture company, SeekOps Inc., has executed a license agreement with the California Institute of Technology for miniature gas sensor technology developed over the last 5 years at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The miniature form factor of this NASA gas sensor enables it to be used as a handheld tool or deployed on small unmanned aerial systems (UAS), commonly known as drones. This technology provides far greater sensitivity than current field-deployable measurement devices, allowing field crews to locate small leaks from infrastructure before they become a safety concern.

Unmanned aerial vehicles — UAVs or "drones" — have been used for years by hobbyists and aircraft enthusiasts, but the field is now seeing rapidly expanding development in commercial applications. One new use is for the collection of RF signal measurements from broadcast television and radio stations, as is being developed by consulting engineering firm Cavell Mertz & Associates.