DRONE, ANOTHER POINT OF VIEW

Nowadays drones appear as an innovative tool with many possibilities. One of the known uses of drones is as messaging tool for transporting products. According with this use, as my colleagues mentioned before, Amazon is working on the Prime Air program where the drones are used to deliver its products to the customers. But, can drones be used for another purpose?

At present, there are many companies which offers different services related with the use of drones. Being a flightless element with suitable proportions for carrying cameras and sensors, drones are used to take aerial images and videos. In the agricultural sector, drones are used for taking pictures of the field, create 3D maps, or for phytosanitary treatments. Drones can also be used as operational support to replace the use of helicopter monitoring for prevention and control of fires, people search or first aid transport, among others.

Figure 1. Phytosanitary treatment with drone. Source: Reproduced from <http://www.dronetools.es/control-de-plagas-y-tratamientos-fitosanitarios/>

The different uses of drones explained before help the logistics of the companies. A drone reduces time of delivery and costs, improves the treatment of the field, generates more security and, in general, improves life of people.

One interesting application of drones is the delivery of drugs to remote places where the people can’t achieve medicines in winter due to the snow, or because they need to travel a lot of kilometers to arrive to a pharmacy, or maybe because they are too old. This is an interesting example where a technology facilitates the distribution and at the same time the life of people.

References:

http://www.amazon.com/b?node=8037720011

http://xn--airdroneespaa-tkb.com/

http://www.dronetools.es/aplicaciones/

http://www.dronplanet.com/servicios-drone/

Aurea Jordán

TECHNOLOGY FACILITATES LOGISTICS

When a business is created, the project must address three key aspects called triple bottom line which are the environmental, social and economic sustainability. In connection with this line of work I defined an agro-food related business called HOF3M.

My project is related with the creation of a garden in the roof of the buildings. This garden would be managed by two workers. The first one is in charge of the irrigation installation and its management. The second one is responsible of planting and caring for plants, this person must plant the seeds of season, set irrigation conditions and reap harvest.

Figure 1. HOF3M proposal. Source: Own elaboration.

This project aims to be:

• Environmentally sustainable. According with the web page of Plume Air Report (https://air.plumelabs.com/) nowadays it is increasing pollution in cities. By increasing the number of plants in urban areas CO₂ can be reduced.
• Residents can eat health food.
• Economic. New technology facilitates the management of the crop.

The logistic of this project should be facilitated by the application of new technologies. For example, there are companies such as Phytech and Modpow which provide agricultural sensors. These sensors can study the crop state and send the information obtained to a web application. There are also other companies such as Dynamax (http://www.dynamax.com/products) that allows you to have automated irrigation systems by the use of sensors.

Figure 2. Phytech technology. Source: Reproduced from <http://www.phytech.com/>

Figure 3. Modpow technology. Source: Reproduced from <http://www.modpow.es/es/tecnologia/>

Aurea Jordán