Category Archives: Energy/Utilities

Open Source for Enterprise Solutions

A geospatial firm integrates open-source GIS and cloud services for the DoD’s IT security, a giant energy co-op managing 2,500 miles of transmission lines, and the USACE as they monitor dredging vessels. Too often, clients maintain outdated and inefficient workflows because they fear that building applications to improve processes would be too time-consuming and expensive....

Powerline Inspection

Drone? Ground? Helicopter? For years now drones, UAVs, UASs or whatever you wish to call them have been the revolution that promises to change the way we live.  Five+ years into the drone revolution we are seeing some change—but it has certainly been a slower progression than expected.  Linewise Aerial specializes in transmission line inspection...

Eclipse Background, NASA

Night in the Afternoon: A US Solar Eclipse

What you need to know about the 2017 solar eclipse The upcoming solar eclipse will leave a 70-mile-wide trail of darkness across the United States on August 21, 2017 (see the map of the eclipse path on pages 44-45). This will be a once-in-a-lifetime event for many people. While another total solar eclipse will make...

GEO Business 2017

Nicholas makes the annual pilgrimage to GEO Business for xyHt This blog is going to start with a short piece about skips. If you are afraid of skips (skips are what you’d call “dumpsters” across the Atlantic), turn away now …. Monday morning and 24 hrs from the start of GEO Business 2017, I get...

This large, cart-style GSSI GPR unit is mounted on a vehicle for sampling at reasonably high speeds.

HyperStacking GPR

A new technology shows promise for enabling users to see deeper targets and operate in noisy conditions. By Jeffrey Feigin, PhD Editor’s Note: The field of ground-penetrating radar (GPR) is experiencing a new wave of development. For many of our readers, first impressions of legacy GPR gear included a lot of limitations and confusing images....

unmanned surveying above water

Inspecting Over the Line With UAV

One of British Columbia’s first aerial inspection firms takes on a challenging maritime mission using a UAV. Featured image: The Raecon team flies a UAV across the Strait of Georgia, performing an aerial power line inspection. AS DAWN BROKE off the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia, Canada, the Raecon Industries team set out by boat...