Select Sands America Corporation is a premium industrial Silica Product company with sand reserves and operations located in northeastern Arkansas. Their property is underlain by the Ordovician St. Peter sandstone formation, the source of premium industrial silica sand ‘Ottawa White’ frac sand, selling into major US oil & gas and Industrial & Specialty end markets. In May, 2017, the company agreed to investigate a drone-based process to determine stockpile volumes. A successful proof of concept (POC) was conducted in late May 2017.
Starting at the end of the 2nd Quarter, 2017, a process was developed to calculate stockpile volumes using imagery acquired by drones. For the past 2 years, this process has been used and improved each successive quarter. As a result, a detailed quarterly report of stockpile volumes is generated in less than a week from start to finish. This new process is more accurate, lower cost, lower risk, performed more frequently and provides much greater documentation than previous and more traditional surveying methods.

Primary Author / Conference Presenter:
Mike Allison
Owner/President
Raptor Aerial Services, LLC
Kingwood, Texas, USA
raptoraerialservices.com