Impact of Drone Regulations on Drone Use in Geospatial Applications and Research: Focus on Visual Range Conditions, Geofencing and Privacy Considerations

The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) laid down the new EU drone regulations in December 2020, which are seen as a development step towards enabling a reliable legal framework for drone operation and use. At the same time, it is still not clear how the new rules will influence drone usage in various drone-based applications and sectors. Therefore, the paper aims to discuss and analyse how recent rules may influence drone use and affect its economic viability with the focus on the geospatial sector. The discussion of rules' impact is achieved based on three key items: visual range limitations, geofencing systems (virtual geographic boundary around specific areas of interest) and, finally, the effect of privacy considerations. To enrich the discussion and get more insight into rules' impact, important issues from different technical and economic aspects were distributed in a questionnaire to collect data from participants who are actively developing or using the drone technology. The questionnaire results revealed that the majority of participants (75%) were of the opinion that it is somehow difficult to judge how the new regulations will help/hinder the drone use at least in the current stage of rules implementation. In addition, there is a tendency in conducting drone flights under visual line of sight conditions even if there are difficulties in keeping a continuous contact with the drone during flight operations. Finally, the results pointed out that 44% of participants faced problems with privacy issues that affected their flight missions, and as a consequence some of the projects even got cancelled.

Automated summary

This paper discusses and analyzes the impact of the new EU drone regulations laid down by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) on drone usage, with a focus on the geospatial sector. The discussion is based on three key factors: visual range limitations, geofencing systems, and privacy considerations. Results from a questionnaire distributed to drone technology developers and users show that it is difficult to assess how the new regulations will affect drone usage in the current stage of implementation. There is a tendency to conduct drone flights within visual line of sight, despite difficulties in maintaining continuous contact with the drone. Privacy issues have also affected flight missions for a significant portion of participants, leading to project cancellations.