根据美国运输部门的πpeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, as well as Deloitte Consulting, the global oil and gas industry spends $37 billion a year monitoring nearly 10 million kilometers of pipelines.

SkyX, a Toronto-based aerospace company, hopes to cash in on that market with a drone-based monitoring system it claims not only could reduce traditional monitoring costs by nearly 90%, but also, using patented technology, provide more comprehensive information faster by employing artificial intelligence to recognize issues and recommend interventions. It says a pilot project in West Canada with an unidentified gas company is scheduled to begin in August.

Didi Horn, a drone pilot, the company’s founder and a former captain in the Israeli Air Force, says savings will come from the reduction of operational and capital costs associated with manned vehicles and aircraft traditionally used to detect damage or threats to pipelines. In addition, Horn says the technology also minimizes the hours now required for monitoring.

“SkyOne can travel at 150 km per hour for 70 minutes and detect leaks, vandalism, vegetation encroachment, and so much more,” Horn says, adding that a key advantage of the system is the UAV’s ability to automatically land, recharge and upload its data via hard-wired connections at stations positioned approximately 100 km apart—the same distance that typically separates pipeline pumping stations.

He says that manned vehicles and helicopters are limited in the amount of time they can monitor a pipeline, whereas a flock of his drones could provide around-the-clock data collection and near real-time video, potentially offering a far wider scope of information, updated more frequently, for pipeline operators.

“我们的无人机不需要返回家庭基础来充电。取而代之的是，它飞到了下一个Xstation，在继续任务之前，它可以在天气屏蔽的圆顶上充电。”。”

根据Horn的说法，当无人机到达下一个XSTation时，它将从该部分收集的所有视频将被下载并发送以进行审查。他说，无人机还将发送有关A.I.检测到的任何管道损坏或违规行为的警报。处理之前，在下载视频之前。

Horn says that to monitor the proposed 3,000-mile-long Keystone Pipeline, planned to extend from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, one drone could cover the entire length every 12 to 15 days. A fleet of 30 drones could cover every inch of the pipeline, every hour.

“The increased frequency of surveillance by our drones makes possible leaks or damages reportable much more quickly,” Horn says. “Many times when there’s a pipeline leak in remote areas they are reported by the public before the oil and gas company monitors even know.”

根据管道和危险材料安全管理局的数据，公众首先报告了2002年至2012年7月之间在美国发生的管道溢出的22％，而遥控传感器仅检测到其中5％。

Accufacts，Inc。总裁Richard Kuprewicz是一家为政府机构提供管道专业知识的咨询公司，他说：“远程发现泄漏是非常困难的。”他说，用无人机（与载人航空车辆相对）飞行空中监视，在成本和效率方面都具有优势。他说：“它应该能够更接近管道。”“先生。霍恩的主张有一个真理。”