White House encourages adoption of drones

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy announced on 2 August actions to encourage adoption of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) across the US. The measures include $35 million in research funding over five years for the design, control, and application of drones in areas such as inspecting electric transmission lines, monitoring agriculture, and studying severe storms.

The White House also announced that it will expand federal agencies’ use of UAVs and accelerate airspace integration research. The Interior Department will employ UAVs in helping protect endangered species and habitats, suppressing wildfires, and increasing accessibility to remote communities. The announcement followed the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA’s) June issuance of a rule that provides nationwide guidelines for the operation of commercial uncrewed aircraft weighing under 25 kg. The new FAA rule permits drone flights for commercial, scientific, public, and educational purposes.

Industry estimates suggest that over the next 10 years, commercial uncrewed aircraft systems could generate more than $82 billion for the US economy and support as many as 100 000 new jobs. The FAA rule opens only a fraction of the potential market, as it applies only to drones that fly below 122 m and within sight of their operators. Since the rule forbids operation over people and beyond-line-of-sight flight, it does not sanction UAV package delivery services being developed by Amazon, Alphabet’s X division, and others.

But the White House announced that X’s Project Wing delivery system will be tried out at one of the FAA’s six drone test sites. At a workshop held in conjunction with the announcement, Mark Blanks, a site director, told participants that the FAA will use the operational data and lessons learned from the tests to develop rules that will cover other categories of UAVs. X also will use existing low-cost, scalable communications and information technologies to develop and deploy an airspace management solution for low-altitude small UAV operations.

The FAA rule also prohibits drone flights within five miles of an airport and requires operators to pass a written test and undergo the same security vetting as pilots of crewed aircraft.

In February 2015 President Obama issued a memorandum ordering federal agencies to ensure privacy as they adopt use of UAVs. A report released 2 August by the Future of Privacy Forum, PrecisionHawk, and Intel Corp called for developers to embed privacy into the design and architecture of their devices, systems, and business practices. The report provides examples of technologies and practices that help drone operators minimize the collection and retention of personal data, obfuscate images of individuals collected from the air, and secure personally identifiable information.