Global carbon emissions need to fall, and fast, but one of the best ways to fight them is hovering above us. Drone technology, primarily associated with film making or the military, is now being used in novel ways to combat man made climate change.

Drones and deforestation

Deforestation is responsible for more than 15% of net global carbon emissions (comparable to the world’s entire transportation sector), making the protection of forests vital in the effort to reduce emissions. Here, again, drones are helping. Costa Rica is currently trailing a project called “Deep Forest” which uses drones to monitor tree degradation and the impact of illegal logging. It is hoped that, by knowing more about the forest, conservation efforts will be more impactful. Drones are also helping plant trees - start up Bio Carbon has created drones that can plant as many as 100,000 trees per day and has spent years replanting the mangroves around the Irrawaddy River in Myanmar.  

Making urban networks green

Hitachi has been conducting research into the impact of urbanisation. It is a very important topic, with more than 55% of the world’s population now residing in urban areas and a lot of them are ordering packages online to be delivered to their door. An estimated 500 million deliveries are expected to be made daily in cities by 2025, yet freight transport in London, for example, was already responsible for around 38% of nitrogen oxide emissions back in 2010.