The Benefits of Drone Inspections in Energy and Construction

Faster, Safer Job Sites

No matter the organization, every company wants to create safer, more efficient job sites. With DroneDeploy imagery, users receive a detailed map or model of their site which they can then use to make better-informed decisions when conducting remote inspections. These easily-accessible datasets increase visibility both on and off the job site and improve communication and accountability across teams. Using drone data to conduct inspections has both variable and predictable benefits.

Variable Benefits

Variable benefits include early detection and dispute resolution. By discovering an issue early, organizations can save up to millions of dollars in repairs, fines, and PR. In the construction industry, we commonly see this in regards to roofing or plumbing. Detecting a plumbing issue is necessary before concrete is poured - if hidden, a massive rework and thousands of dollars are required to fix. The most common reason to be called back on-site is for missing or defective flashing, and it’s expensive to mobilize a repair team. The costs will only multiply with water damage if this isn’t discovered quickly.

Drone mapping is also beneficial for conflict resolution. In the case of a dispute, drone imagery provides geo-tagged, time-stamped historical data to provide to the appropriate parties. We’ve seen this used to demonstrate compliance with municipalities and other government agencies, and validating work with subcontractors.

Predictable Benefits

DroneDeploy’s Inspection and Resolution Workflow provide predictable benefits like time and cost savings. Prior to drone software, organizations solely relied on superintendents walking the site to find and photograph issues in a timely manner. From there, multiple messaging platforms were used to notify and assign responsibility to the correct individuals. As expected, this can often result in a lack of clarity across teams and an unclear record of events.

With minimal flight time, a drone flown with DroneDeploy software can capture maps, 3D models, panoramas, and videos to view in-app. According to the California Resources Corporation, this results in a 90% reduction in inspection time, with the added ability to perform remote inspections. Today, DroneDeploy customer Brasfield & Gorrie envisions their 2-3 days allotted for facade crack inspections reduced to just 4-5 hours with DroneDeploy software. These improvements are possible because of DroneDeploy’s capture and resolution workflow, which centralizes communications and eliminates tedious back-and-forth. The inspection workflow allows the user to tag and assign issues to individuals on the map, and the recipient can respond and close-out the issue in turn.