State Grid Nanjing Power Supply Company Expands Drone Inspection Scenarios

Recently, State Grid Nanjing Power Supply Company completed a fully automated inspection of the densely arranged power cable channels at the 110kV Yinlong Substation using a fixed drone airport, further expanding the application scenarios for drone-powered inspections.

A fixed drone airport refers to a stationary drone nest facility specifically deployed within a designated area of a substation. It integrates comprehensive functions such as drone takeoff, landing, parking, charging, and status monitoring. By deeply integrating intelligent and automated technologies, this facility enables precise, efficient, and unmanned full-process monitoring and management of drone operations, covering key stages such as mission planning, flight execution, data collection, and status feedback, ensuring the safety and efficiency of drone operations.

Caption: A drone takes off from the fixed airport at the substation to inspect the densely packed cable corridors.

Previously, fixed drone airports primarily focused on autonomous inspection tasks for transmission lines, achieving periodic inspections and defect identification through preset flight paths and task parameters. This inspection used a fixed drone airport to inspect cable corridors, effectively enhancing the anti-external damage capability of densely packed distribution cable corridors. A corridor is considered densely packed if it contains four or more distribution cables. The densely packed distribution cable corridors at the Yinlong Substation involve cables such as the 20 kV Yin Tong Line, which supply power to important users like the Zijin Mountain Laboratory.

Caption: A drone takes off from the fixed airport at the substation to inspect the densely packed cable corridors.

During this inspection, the drone operation center of State Grid Nanjing Power Supply Company issued instructions to the fixed airport inside the Yinlong Substation, located 20 kilometers away. The drone then flew along the preset path to check for potential external damage risks above the densely packed corridors and whether relevant markings were clear. The time required for a single inspection was reduced from the previous 2 to 3 hours using manual methods to just 16 minutes. (By Zhou Yu)