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June 3, 2020 06:04 pm

Stanford Lab Envisions Delivery Drones that Save Energy by Taking the Bus

Researchers from Stanford University have devised a way for hundreds of drones to use the bus or trams in an effort to redesign how packages are distributed in cities. Should such a solution ever scale, it could reduce delivery van congestion and energy usage while extending the distance a drone can travel to deliver a package. From a report: There's a reason most delivery drones we've seen thus far are dropping packages off in the suburbs. Urban centers can be dynamic environments, full of unexpected obstacles, and drones are still not permitted to fly freely through cities. But researchers say using public transportation can increase a drone's range up to 360% beyond travel with flight alone. "Our approach strives to minimize the maximum time to complete any delivery," the team writes in a paper published this week at the online 2020 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA). "By combining the strengths of both, we can achieve significant commercial benefits and social impact." This approach, which involves the drones hitching a ride on the outside of buses and trams, could help overcome the limited travel capacity of drones today. The popular DJI Mavic 2, for example, is able to fly a maximum distance of 18 kilometers, or about 11 miles round trip.

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