Case study

Elia Group × Avy

BVLOS flights completed successfully

0

total distance flown

0km

high-voltage power lines inspected

0km

Elia Group operates over 8,000 kilometres of high-voltage electricity transmission infrastructure across Belgium. Inspecting that network safely, frequently, and at scale is one of the defining operational challenges in European energy infrastructure.

The problem

Helicopter patrols are the current benchmark for high-voltage grid inspection. They are thorough but expensive, manual, infrequent, and dependent on weather and airspace availability. Ground crews offer detail but cannot cover the distances required. Static camera systems provide no mobility or a from the top of pylons or wires.

Elia recognised that the traditional inspection model could not scale to meet the demands of a digitised, reliability-critical grid. Their long-term target: conduct 80% of asset monitoring remotely.

The specific challenges were:

  • Coverage: VLOS drone operations can only inspect small clusters of pylons at a time, nowhere near viable for a network of this scale

  • Regulatory complexity: BVLOS operations over high-voltage infrastructure across national borders had never been validated in this configuration

  • Data quality: Inspection data needed to meet Elia's own technical standards for fault detection, not just produce imagery, but actionable intelligence

The solution

Avy and Elia designed a structured Proof of Concept (PoC) to test whether BVLOS drone operations could meet the standard required for operational deployment across Elia's grid.

The programme ran across four modules: BVLOS flight validation, advanced sensor payload testing, remote operations and docking demonstration, and AI-driven data analysis.

Aircraft and sensors

The Avy Aera 4 flew the primary inspection routes, carrying the Raptor (AirAware Camera) for combined optical and thermal imaging, enabling detection of both visual defects and heat anomalies such as overheating insulators. A DJI M300 carrying the YellowScan Ultra LiDAR system ran parallel routes, capturing high-density 3D point clouds for vegetation encroachment mapping and precise pylon geometry.

Regulatory framework

Operating BVLOS in Belgian airspace under Avy's Dutch LUC required a Cross-Border Operations application to the Belgian Civil Aviation Authority (BCAA), real-time coordination with the Belgian Ministry of Defence for airspace deconfliction, and a full local conditions assessment. This was the first time Avy's LUC privileges had been validated cross-border at this scale, a regulatory milestone as significant as the technical one.

AI analysis

Post-flight data was processed through the Arkensight platform, where every image was spatially mapped to the specific pylon ID in Elia's asset register. AI models were trained on the collected dataset to automatically detect anomalies

  • Vegetation encroachment, corrosion, broken insulators, and thermal hotspots

  • Graded by severity and linked directly to individual assets for ingestion into Elia's asset management system.

The results

The PoC completed a dedicated week of flight operations in December 2025, in sub-zero temperatures and high humidity, with only one day lost to weather.

8 BVLOS flights completed successfully

  • 261.6 km total distance flown

  • 85 km of high-voltage power lines inspected

  • 3 hours 42 minutes total flight time

  • 42% average battery usage per flight

  • Cross-border BVLOS approval secured and validated with BCAA

  • LiDAR successfully mapped vegetation encroachment and identified structural detail at pylon level

  • AI anomaly detection pipeline established and linked to Elia's asset register

  • "Flying 261 kilometres of BVLOS inspection in a week, in December, in Belgian airspace, under a cross-border regulatory framework we'd never used before, was genuinely demanding. The fact that we came away with clean data, no incidents, and a validated regulatory pathway is what makes this a meaningful step forward for grid inspection at scale."

    Avy

    Warwick Tucker, Project Manager

  • "Flying 261 kilometres of BVLOS inspection in a week, in December, in Belgian airspace, under a cross-border regulatory framework we'd never used before, was genuinely demanding. The fact that we came away with clean data, no incidents, and a validated regulatory pathway is what makes this a meaningful step forward for grid inspection at scale."

    Avy

    Warwick Tucker, Project Manager

  • "Flying 261 kilometres of BVLOS inspection in a week, in December, in Belgian airspace, under a cross-border regulatory framework we'd never used before, was genuinely demanding. The fact that we came away with clean data, no incidents, and a validated regulatory pathway is what makes this a meaningful step forward for grid inspection at scale."

    Avy

    Warwick Tucker, Project Manager

  • "Flying 261 kilometres of BVLOS inspection in a week, in December, in Belgian airspace, under a cross-border regulatory framework we'd never used before, was genuinely demanding. The fact that we came away with clean data, no incidents, and a validated regulatory pathway is what makes this a meaningful step forward for grid inspection at scale."

    Avy

    Warwick Tucker, Project Manager

What this means for energy infrastructure operators

The Elia PoC demonstrated that BVLOS drone inspection is not a future capability, it is operational today, under existing European regulatory frameworks, at distances and scales that make it a genuine alternative to helicopter patrols.

For transmission system operators managing thousands of kilometres of overhead infrastructure, the combination of long-range VTOL aircraft, autonomous docking, and AI-driven analysis changes the economics of routine inspection and emergency response.

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