Futuristic technology is proving that it can create efficiencies for building operations, and facilities managers are finding ways to incorporate it into their tasks. But while many facilities managers may be knowledgeable about the Internet of Things (IoT), building information modeling (BIM), artificial intelligence (AI), new sustainability measures, and cloud-based solutions, there could be some tech they would like to learn more about.
So, when it comes to drones and robots, how can FMs use this technology to boost facility operations and protect occupants?
Drones
These flying machines, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), are robotic aircraft that have literally and figuratively taken off in recent years. Facilities managers should use drones to both protect and inspect their properties. Flying drones for commercial, governmental, or any other non-recreational purpose does require becoming a certified remote pilot. To learn more, visit the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) website.
Perimeter Security
Whether protecting governmental, educational, commercial, or industrial facilities, drones are a great option. In all these examples, drones are not meant to substitute security and police but, rather, to supplement their efforts.
- Governmental: Governmental agencies should consider using drones to monitor perimeters. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) uses drones to patrol a portion of the perimeter fence around Langley Research Center, in Hampton, Virginia, producing live streaming video. Anything suspicious can be viewed by staff from the Mission Operations & Autonomous Integration Center (MOSAIC) where they can control the drones.
- Educational: Many colleges and universities use drones to increase campus safety. The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus, in Urbana, Illinois, uses drones to detect suspicious behaviors of individuals who might be preparing an attack during Division I football games and other large events, according to a statement from the university’s Division of Public Safety.
- Commercial: Some shopping malls use drones, with high-resolution cameras, to identify suspicious individuals and vehicles. Dolphin Mall, in Miami, Florida, is just one example. These drones can follow and chase individuals until officers from the local police department arrive. In addition, police cruisers have license plate readers that can work with these drones.
- Industrial: Drones can be used to protect industrial facilities like oil, gas, and mining operations. Specifically, these drones can use different sensors and imaging technologies, such as leak detection, surveying, predictive maintenance, and disaster management. Chevron works with American Aerospace Technologies to use AiRanger drones for preplanned and automated pipeline inspections in San Joaquin Valley, California.
Facility Inspections
Seeking to perform rooftop inspections or infrastructure inspections? Drones can help solve or prevent problems for your facilities staff.
- Rooftop Inspections: Rather than sending a person to get up on a compromised roof, a drone can detect areas of moisture in the submembrane of roofs and facades that are not visible to the naked eye. This detection is made possible through thermal cameras. The City of Albuquerque, New Mexico is an example of a municipality planning department that uses drones to take photos to complete re-roofing building inspections.
- Energy Inspections: Drones can inspect buildings to help enhance ESG (environmental, social, and governance) performance. Specifically, they can be used to detect energy efficiencies, environmental hazards, heat loss, air leakage, and structural defects. They can also detect water ingress. Additionally, drones can be used to detect issues with specific photovoltaic (PV) cells of solar panels.
Construction Projects
When it comes to safety, construction monitoring, earthwork verification, or project communication drones can meet your needs.
- Maintain Safety Standards: At construction sites, drones and 360-degree cameras are being used to provide a view of the ground with critical project and progress data.
- Construction Monitoring: Shell used drones to monitor the construction of Shell Polymers Monaca, in Monaca, Pennsylvania, to provide aerial images for 3D modeling of the site.
- Earthwork Verification: While Brasfield & Gorrie was doing work on the Florida Hospital Apopka, a 61-acre hospital construction site in Apopka, Florida, they used drone mapping to verify the subcontractor’s earthwork matched what was designed. Measuring the elevations of the earthworks using traditional methods would have been more expensive and created a time-consuming delay in opening the hospital, now known as AdventHealth Apopka.
- Project Communication: Drones and 360-degree cameras have allowed the easy sharing of critical information and progress data across project teams no matter where they are geographically. Some of the projects benefitting from this have included the Marcus Tower at Piedmont, based in Atlanta, Georgia, which allowed them to open amid increasing demand for medical attention due to COVID-19.
Window Cleaning
Facilities managers of large buildings can use drones to clean their windows and buildings.
- The KFC Yum! Center in Louisville, Kentucky, uses an 8-foot square drone to pressure wash their large windows. It has proven to be more time-efficient than washing the windows by hand. The drone is connected to a hose on the ground and uses water and pressure to clean.
Robots
Robots are useful for doing repetitive tasks. For example, facilities managers use robots to clean buildings, fulfill orders in warehouses and distribution facilities, and sort at recycling plants. Robots can also act as a part of security teams at facilities.
Robots are becoming more commonplace in worksites and public settings to help with the following tasks:
Cleaning
Several types of facilities have embraced using robots for cleaning which includes retail, restaurants, healthcare facilities, and airports.
Grocery store chain Stop & Shop uses a 6-foot-tall movable robot, named Marty, as it works to clean up trash and spills. The robot can take pictures of hazards and employees can come to fix them.
Warehouse and Distribution
Many warehouses have robots collaborating with workers to fulfill orders. Some companies have warehouse mobile robot systems that download orders.
Collaborative robots help create safer workplaces in some fulfillment centers, like the Amazon center near Dayton, Ohio, to help humans avoid the strain of retrieving or storing items in tall racks, which means fewer muscle injuries and accidents. This facility became the seventh robotics fulfillment center in Ohio when it opened in August 2024.
Recycling
Let’s face it. There are some jobs that people don’t want to do. And sorting out recycling from the trash is one of them.
Many recycling facilities across the country face major staffing shortages and staff are often overburdened. Robots can replace or supplement the work of human pickers and help detect what is recyclable and separate and sort recyclables into distinct groups. They can facilitate the process of removing non-recyclable and hazardous items.
In one facility in Indiana, more than two million plastic bottles have been saved from landfills in just the first four months alone by using robots.
Security
Robots can serve alongside police or security in tasks such as perimeter security, security of public places, and airport security. Facilities professionals can work with security professionals to determine what needs are best met with security-like robots.
Security Robot Dogs
Security robot dogs, which are four-legged doglike robots, can crouch low and crawl into small spaces, and run as fast as 3.5 miles per hour.
These automatic robotic systems can cover a lot of ground for large facility campuses. They can patrol along fence lines and large corporate campuses. They can identify, engage, and deter threats including cuts in a fence line.
Additionally, security robot dogs have been used by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) which can climb stairs, open doors, detect hazardous substances, and be customized with thermal imaging.
Robotic Security Guards
Meant to complement human security guards inside and outside facilities, robots have several tools such as 360-degree high-definition video imaging and recording, project and record two-way audio, detect motion and physical objects in front of the robot, and navigate through hazardous environments.
Robotic security guards have proven helpful in patrolling perimeters of residential communities and apartment buildings. They even patrol downtown streets such as Atlanta and San Diego helping to keep downtown facilities safe.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams and the New York City Police Department (NYPD) piloted a Knightscope K5 400-pound robot to patrol the main station area of the Times Square Subway Station in 2023, recording video and offering a connection to a live person through a call button to help travelers in the subway.
Additionally, the K5 robot has been designed to patrol entrances, parking areas, and interior spaces of a variety of facilities such as airports, casinos, commercial real estate, corporate campuses, homeowner associations, hospitals, hotels, manufacturing, logistical facilities, and schools.
Conclusion
Drones and robots open many opportunities for facilities managers to efficiently run building operations as well as secure buildings. Facilities managers should consider how drones and robots can be useful at their organizations in automating tasks and supplementing security.