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Environmental Management Services

Environmental management agencies are increasingly turning to drones for quantifying and measuring changes in the natural environment. This falls into several categories;

  1. Land surveys

  2. Environmental surveys

  3. Wildlife surveys

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1. Land Surveys

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Land surveys are looking at the visual properties of the land itself. They may be 2-dimensional (Orthomaps), or 3-dimensional (eg to capture significant geological features).

 

Land surveys may be periodical or ad-hoc, such as a survey done after a bushfire, or a coastal erosion survey done after a tropical storm. Often, the surveys are required to be replicated over the same area, but at specified periods of time, to enable study of natural regeneration at different set intervals such as 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, etc.

 

CDS Differentiators:

  • Significant experience in this area, see Surveying / Mapping / Spatial services earlier in this section

  • Multiple ways of planning and recording flights, then recreating with automated (repeatable) missions;

    • My Matrice 300 allows manually-flown complex missions to be recorded using Live Mission Recording, including when and where photos and videos were taken, which can be recreated as an automated mission at anytime. See CDS Resources

    • AI Spot Check further enhances Live Mission Recording, with the ability to edit the specific framing and zoom of photos to be taken

    • Automated “Mission Flights” can be created, saved and recreated at anytime. These are ideal for automated surveys using grid-based flights.

    • Simpler missions can use “Waypoint” missions to record specific flight locations and actions to be taken at those locations, which can be recreated at anytime

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2. Environmental Surveys

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Environmental surveys look at some specific quality of the land, eg soil moisture content, or methane gas detection. Many factors go into determining the type of sensor required to measure the quality being measured. For example, for soil moisture, you need to look at whether you want to measure soil moisture at the surface, or below the surface, and if so, how far below the surface. You need to look at whether you are more concerned with the indirect effects of soil moisture, ie plant health, or the actual soil moisture itself. You need to look at whether you need an instantaneous result, or a figure that is derived over a period of time. All these things and more go into determining the type of sensor required, and the way data is gathered.

 

Once the data is gathered, scientific modelling and comparison testing may be needed to generate the required output, in order to get reliable results.

 

Methane gas is just one of many toxic gases that drone-mounted sensors can detect. Sensor selection hinges on what gases need to be detected, at what range they need to be detected, and so on.

 

CDS Differentiators:

  • My Matrice 300 is capable of carrying a wide range of third-party sensors, due to its open interface standards, third-party software development kit, and large payload capacity, see CDS Resources

  • Leading-edge scientific research available in this area, via Partner Network

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3. Wildlife Surveys

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Wildlife surveys may include studies of creatures on land, sea, and in the air. For example, a survey may involve scanning a set area of the ocean, looking for whales. If it is required to get close to the wildlife without scaring them away, drones can be ideal for this, as boats often scare wildlife if they get too close. Operationally, it may be necessary to get within a few hundred metres of the wildlife in a boat before launching the drone for the final approach. A zoom camera would allow observing them at a distance that would not disturb them. If launching from land, it may be necessary to do this as an EVLoS Class I, or even BVLoS operation (if done regularly, and beyond 1.5km distance out from land).

 

On land, drones can use the heat signature of animals for location purposes. For example, suppose some-one wanted to study the number of koalas in a given area. A thermal camera on a drone would provide an ideal platform to locate the animals. A zoom camera would then allow observing them at a distance that would not disturb them.

 

CDS Differentiators:

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