Electric and natural gas company, Xcel Energy, based in Minneapolis, is testing the feasibility of using drones within their inspecting operations. More than 320,000 miles of electricity and natural gas infrastructure requires routine inspection and Vice President of Operation Services, Michael Lamb, says the drones could be used to inspect their large boilers, transmission and natural gas lines.
When asked about how the drones would affect their current workforce, replacing the former manual inspection method, the company sees no problem.

Lamb says that using drones will benefit not only the company by reducing costs, but it will serve employees and customers as well.

He says the employees currently working in the inspection process will not be lacking work to do, and the overall goal is to “keep the lights on.”

Xcel Energy serves approximately 3.5 million electric customers and 1.9 million natural gas customers.