Construction Research Congress 2020
Potential Applications of UAV within the Construction Industry and the Challenges Limiting Implementation
Publication: Construction Research Congress 2020: Project Management and Controls, Materials, and Contracts
ABSTRACT
The traditional collection and processing methods of big spatial data, specifically for larger construction projects, is impractical and could be improved with unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology. This paper presents an exploratory study that identifies the potential applications of UAVs within the construction industry as well as the challenges that limit their implementation into the industry. Specific examples of applications that could improve jobsite safety, reduce material waste, facilitate inspections, and decrease surveying costs are described. The findings suggest that the current challenges can be generally categorized into three areas: (1) the legal and regulatory requirements, (2) the features and abilities of the UAVs, and (3) the qualities and capabilities of the data capturing, processing, and presentation software. However, this paper will not consider the issues associated with the qualities and capabilities of the data capturing and processing due to the variety of software available and the variation in reported accuracies. Although the quality of an UAV can significantly influence its usability and in turn affect the quality of results, this review only considers the use of commercially available and economically relevant systems, which construction organizations are most likely to utilize. Findings indicate that, among others, the limitations of commercially available UAVs include restricted operation in adverse weather conditions, the inability to autonomously navigate dynamic environments, and inadequate weight capacity. Accordingly, this survey is beneficial for future research on UAV uses as it broadly presents, and serves as a resource for, the potential applications as well as the key challenges of UAVs across different applications.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this chapter.
REFERENCES
Alizadehsalehi, S., Yitmen, I., Celik, T., & Arditi, D. (2018). “The Effectiveness of an Integrated BIM/UAV Model in Managing Safety on Construction Sites.” International Journal of Occupational Safety and Ergonomics.
Ashour, R., Taha, T., Mohamed, F., Hableel, E., Kheil, Y. A., Elsalamouny, M., . . . Seneviratne, L. (2016). “Site Inspection Drone: A Solution for Inspecting and Regulating Construction Sites.” IEEE 59th International Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems.
Bottyan, Z. (2014). “In-flight icing characteristics of unmanned aerial vehicles during special atmospheric condition over the carpathian-basin.” ACTA Geographica Debrecina Landscape and Environment, 74-80.
Casati, G., Longhi, M., Latini, D., Carbone, F., Amendola, S., Del Frate, F., . . . Marrocco, G. (2017). “The Interrogation Footprint of RFID-UAV: Electromagnetic Modeling and Experimentations.” IEEE Journal of Radio Frequency Identification.
Cui, Z. H., Hua, W. S., Liu, X. G., Guo, T., & Yan, Y. (2017). “Key Technologies of Laser Power Transmission for In-flight UAVs Recharging.” IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science.
Danjuma, S. B., Omar, Z., & Abdullah, M. N. (2018). “Review of Photovoltaic Cells for Solar-Powered Aircraft Applications.” International Journal of Engineering and Technology, 131-135.
Dong, X., Ren, Y., Meng, J., Lu, S., Wu, T., & Sun, Q. (2018). “Design and Implementation of Multi-rotor UAV Power Relay Platform.” In 2018 2nd IEEE Advanced Information Management, Communicates, Electronic and Automation Control Conference (IMCEC) (pp. 1142-1146). IEEE.
Dupont, Q. F., Chua, D. K., Tashrif, A., & Abbott, E. L. (2017). “Potential Applications of UAV along the Construction's Value Chain.” 7th International Conference on Engineering, Project, and Production Management. Elsevier.
Eltner, A., Kaiser, A., Castillo, C., Rock, G., Neugirg, F., & Abellán, A. (2016). “Image-Based Surface Reconstruction in Geomorphometry – Merits, Limits and Developments.” Earth Surface Dynamics, 359-389.
Erdelj, M., & Natalizio, E. (2016). “UAV Assisted Disaster Management: Applications and Open Issues.” International Conference on Computing, Networking and Communications, 1-5.
Federal Aviation Administration. (2018). “FAA Aerospace Forecasts.” Retrieved from https://www.faa.gov/data_research/aviation/aerospace_forecasts/media/
Fladeland, M., Schoenung, S., & Lord, M. (2017). “UAS Platforms.” NCAR / EOL Workshop - Unmanned Aircraft Systems for Atmospheric Research -2017.
Floreano, D., & Wood, R. J. (2015). “Science, Technology and the Future of Small Autonomous Drones”. Nature, 460-466.
Hallermann, N., & Morgenthal, G. (2014). “Visual Inspection Strategies for Large Bridges Using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV).” Proc. of 7th IABMAS, International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management.
Ham, Y., Han, K., Lin, J., & Golparvar-Fard, M. (2016). “Visual Monitoring of Civil Infrastructure Systems via Camera-Equipped Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): A Review of Related Works.” Visualization in Engineering.
Han, K. k.-F. (2015). “A Formalisim for Utilization of Autonomous Vision-Based Systems and Integrated Project Models for Construction Progress Monitoring.” Conference on Autonomous and Robotic Construction of Infastructure.
Herrmann, M. M. (2017). “A Comparison of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Regulations in the United States and Europe.” 53rd ASC Annual International Conference Proceedings.
Huang, W-H., Otero, L. D., Otero, C. E., & Moyou, M. (2018). “Impact of Camera Vibration Frequencies on Image Noise for Unmanned Aerial System Applications.” Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
Hunt, G., Mitzalis, F., Alhinia, T., Hooper, P. A., & Kovac, M. (2014). “3D Printing with Flying Robots.” Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
Karsch, K., Golparvar-Fard, M., & Forysth, D. (2014). “ConstructAide: Analyzing and Visualizing Construction Sites through Photographs and Building Models.” ACM Transactions on Graphics.
Lambey, V., & Prasad, A. D. (2018). “Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Applications Of 3D Modelling, Visualization And Parameter Calculations.” International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing & Spatial Information Sciences.
Latteur, P., Goessens, S., Mueller, & Caitlin. (2016). “Masonry Construction with Drones.” Proceedings of IASS Annual Symposia, 1-10.
Lin, J., Han, K., Fukuchi, Y., Eda, M., & Golparvar-Fard, M. (2015). “Model based Monitoring of work in progress via Images Taken by Camera equipped UAV and BIM.” International Conference on Civil and Building Engineering Informatics.
Liu, J., Jennesse, M., & Holley, P. (2016). “Utilizing Light Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for the Inspection of Curtain Walls: A Case Study.” Construction Research Congress 2016, 2651-2659.
Mittal, M., Mohan, R., Burgard, W., & Valada, A. (2019). “Vision-Based Autonomous UAV Navigation and Landing for Urban Search and Rescue.” arXiv preprint.
Moser, V., Barisic, I., Rajle, D., & Dimter, S. (2016). “Comparison of Different Survey Methods Data Accuracy for Road Design and Construction.” 4th International Conference on Road and Rail Infrastructure.
Motawa, I., & Kardakou, A. (2018). “Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) for Inspection in Construction and Building Industry.” The 16th International Operation & Maintenance Conference, 2018.
Oettershagen, P., Melzer, A., Mantel, T., Rudin, K., Stastny, T., Wawrzacz, B., . . . Leutenegger, S. (2107). “Perpetual Flight with a Small Solar-powered UAV: Flight Results, Performance analysis and Model Validation.” Journal of Field Robotics.
Opfer, N. D., & Shields, D. R. (2014). “Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Applications and Issues for Construction.” 121st ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition.
Otto, A., Agatz, N., Campbell, J., Golden, B., & Pesch, E. (2018). “Optimization Approaches for Civil Applications of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) or Aerial Drones: A Survey.” Networks, 411-458.
Ouyang, J., Che, Y., Xu, J., & Wu, K. (2018). “Throughput Maximization for Laser-Powered UAV Wireless Communication Systems.” International Conference on Communications Workshops (ICC Workshops), 1-6.
Perez, M. A., Zech, W. C., & Donald, W. N. (2015). “Using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to Conduct Site Inspections of Erosion and Sediment Control Practices and Track Project Progression.” Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board.
Polvara, R., Patacchiola, M., Sharma, S., Wan, J., Manning, A., Sutton, R., & Cangelosi, A. (2017). “Autonomous Quadrotor Landing using Deep Reinforcement Learning.” arXiv e-prints.
Polvara, R., Patacchiola, M., Sharma, S., Wan, J., Manning, A., Sutton, R., & Cangelosi, A. (2018). “Toward End-to-End Control for UAV Autonomous Landing via Deep Reinforcement Learning.” 2018 International Conference on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (ICUAS), 115-123.
Pyronneau, P., Garmistani, H., & Allen, J. (2019). “The Effects of Polycrystalline Silicon Photovoltaic Cells on Unamanned Aerial Vehicle Performance.” School of Materials Science and Engineering Undergraduate Research Theses.
Ragauskas, U., Brucas, D., & Visockiene, J. S. (2016). “Research of Remotely Piloted Vehicles for Carge Transpertation.” Aviation.
San, K. T., Mun, S. J., & Yeong Hun Choe, Y. S. (2018). “UAV Delivery Monitoring System.” MATEC Web of Conferences.
Siebert, S., & Teizer, J. (2014). “Mobil 3D Mapping for Surveying Earthwork Projects Using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle System.” Automation in Construction.
Simica, M., Bil, C., & Vojisavljevicb, V. (2015). “Investigation in Wireless Power Transmission for UAV Charging.” Procedia Computer Science, 1846-1855.
Skycatch Inc. (2019). Skycatch Inc. “Explore1 Specifications Sheet.” Retrived from: http://explore1.skycatch.com/
Stöcker, C., Bennett, R., Nex, F., Gerke, M., & Zevenbergen, J. (2017). “Review of the Current State of UAV Regulations.” Remote sensing.
United States Government Accountability Office. (2018). “Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems - FAA Should Improve Its Management of Safety Risks.”
Vacanas, Y., Themistocleous, K., Agapiou, A., & Hadjimitsis, D. (2015). “Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) Technologies in Infrastructure Construction Project Management and Delay and Disruption Analysis.” International Society for Optics and Photonics.
Vivek, S. (2018). “Liability Issue of Domestic Drones.” Santa Clara High Technology Law Journal.
Wang, X., Al-Shabbani, Z., Sturgill, R., Kirk, A., & Dadi, G. B. (2017). “Estimating Earthwork Volumes Through Use of Unmanned Aerial Systems.” Transportation Research Record: Journal of Transportation Research Board.
Westbrook, T., & Rostvik, H. (2018). “Solar Energy and Battery Development for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: Leading to Increased Proliferation?” Salus Journal.
Yan, S., Opazo, T., Palacios, J., Langelaan, J. W., & Germain, L. D. (2018). “Experimental Evaluation of Multi-rotor UAV Operation Under Icing Conditions.” Annual Forum Proceedings-AHS International 2018.
Zakaria, S., Mahadi, M. R., Abdullah, A. F., & Abdan, K. (2018). “Aerial Platform Reliability for Flood Monitoring Under Various Weather Conditions: A Review.” GeoInformation for Disaster Management Conference, 295-314.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Construction Research Congress 2020: Project Management and Controls, Materials, and Contracts
Pages: 31 - 39
Editors: David Grau, Ph.D., Arizona State University, Pingbo Tang, Ph.D., Arizona State University, and Mounir El Asmar, Ph.D., Arizona State University
ISBN (Online): 978-0-7844-8288-9
Copyright
© 2020 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Published online: Nov 9, 2020
Published in print: Nov 9, 2020
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.