Safe drone operation key to smart cities

A relaxation of regulations governing the use of drones while unmanned autonomous vehicle safety is simultaneously improved will be key to boosting economies globally.

Whether it be for delivering pizza, transporting medical supplies, or conducting aerial photography, the value drones bring to a spectrum of industries is already measured in the billions of dollars and set to increase exponentially in the next few years.

Appropriate regulation that nurtures these lucrative economic opportunities is essential, especially in China, where there are an estimated 1,200 drone companies that are all pushing to innovate services.

Drones are, no doubt, a potentially hazardous technology that needs regulating. Incidents in the last few years at airports around the world have proven just how disruptive they can be. Whether it be Newark airport near New York, Stockholm's Arlanda, or the Christmas chaos seen at Gatwick Airport near London in 2018, one sighting of a cheap, commercially available drone in a place it should not be can spell disaster for expensive logistical operations around the world.

Alongside near misses with aircraft, drones have been used to smuggle contraband into prisons and to conduct many other criminal activities.

A balance, therefore, has to be struck for authorities wishing to safely harvest the rewards of unmanned autonomous vehicle, or UAV, technology.

Safety rules must be enforced more efficiently.

Currently, in most countries, drones must be registered if they are heavier than a certain weight and they cannot be legally flown over built-up areas.

Specific flights in such places must also have prior permission, alongside a visual line of sight of the operator. This requires drone operators to hire additional expensive staff, and manually obtaining permission can be a lengthy process.

New industry standards for delivery drones, as seen in China, could streamline this process. Working with large e-commerce giants such as JD.com and ZTO Express, take-off weights and pre-agreed airspeeds can all be agreed to cut through the bureaucracy currently weighing down global drone operations.

Similar models around the world are currently in development.

Drone deliveries are predicted to be the next-stage that powerful e-commerce nations, such as China, will take, meaning that laying down infrastructure now is crucial.

Automated air traffic management systems are also in the process of mainstream rollouts. Systems that detect drones flying below 122 meters in parts of Virginia, Nevada, and North Dakota in the United States will help safely integrate commercial drones into existing air traffic control networks, thereby removing them as threats to traditional aircraft through assimilation.

Building a well-oiled and safety-conscious relationship with aviation authorities will be key to ensuring that drone industries continue to contribute to economies globally.

And new innovation is on the horizon. Earlier this year, Huawei announced that it had patented a UAV control system method that uses artificial intelligence to process system data and facilitate drone movements safely.

This means that interaction information of controlled UAVs can be relayed to correspond with environmental data and actions sent out near instantaneously, providing an automated and safe air management system. Such a system, which can utilize AI to solve drone safety issues, would be game changing for an industry struggling to balance its novel utility with its disruptive nature.