Utility companies in Maryland use drones for infrastructure inspections: ‘It is a lot safer’

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When the power goes out, residents want their utilities back as soon as possible. Walking in an area with an outage can be time-consuming and potentially dangerous for crews, especially after a significant weather event.

Utility companies operating in Maryland, such as Baltimore Gas & Electric and Potomac Edison, are using drones for infrastructure inspections leading to increased safety for crews, a reduced carbon footprint and faster times inspecting equipment.

Potomac Edison has been using drones for about a decade and has increased the use of the small aircraft as the technology has gotten better.

Crews previously had to walk under the lines and look up to inspect them using different tools.

“A drone gives you the perspective of looking down and shows the whole totality of the line and the situation,” said Hannah Catlett, spokesperson for First Energy, which owns Potomac Edison. “That is a huge improvement.”

Utility companies often have their equipment and facilities in remote, difficult-to-access areas. Before drones, crews had to physically reach each facility to do an inspection. “It is a lot safer to be able to send a drone to do that same inspection,” she said.

Drones have been a part of BGE’s services since 2018. Andy McCauley, who leads the BGE drone program team, notes the company used to use helicopters to inspect transmission systems. This often caused concern as well as a nuisance for residential customers. They decided to do a couple of pilot programs to understand the data quality and how the data compared to helicopters.

“We actually found we could meet the helicopter’s data output at a reduced cost and it will reduce disturbance to our customers,” he said. “We were greenlighted and the program has been looking at comprehensive visual inspections of these towers ever since.”

Another inspection the company does is for gas mains that run under state road bridges. Employees used to have to go underneath these bridges facing ravines, steep cut-offs and rocky terrain. Concerned about employee slips, trips and falls, they now use drones to make the trip under the bridges.

“For us, the safety impact of not having an employee at risk or at a higher risk being in that environment was a huge win for us,” McCauley said.

BGE has also used drones to hang waterway markers over bodies of water so sailboats know height restrictions due to power lines in the areas.

Another use is inspecting osprey nests near their equipment to see if there are eggs or young chicks there. Having the birds on the equipment can be a safety concern. If the nest is clear, it may be relocated or removed. If there are eggs or chicks present, they monitor the site.

“We have mitigation processes we go through,” he said. “We try to put up bird deterrents. We don’t want them to come in contact with our equipment. … We have approaches where we put up platforms for them to nest. If they are always coming back up to a pole, we put up another pole for them with a platform so they can live there.”

While each situation is different, McCauley notes using drones is slightly faster than walking and driving inspections.

“One of the things we look at is how thorough of an inspection are we performing and we are really happy with the speed in which we are performing and the amount of data we can bring back and process to understand how our equipment is aging and then really what those concerns would be.”

Drones can provide a large amount of data to utility companies including understanding how their system is aging and repairing equipment as it becomes a safety or reliability concern. They are also using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to look at drone footage and pinpoint failing equipment and crews can replace the infrastructure proactively.

“For us, being customer-focused is really huge,” he said. “Innovation and having an innovative mindset allows us to do more with the funds that we have.”