The United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has released its final environmental impact assessment of DroneUp LLC’s drone package delivery service in the Dallas area. The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is the United States’ basic national charter for protection of the environment. It is a procedural law that requires the FAA to consider environmental impacts of its actions in decision making.
DroneUp plans to extend its drone retail package delivery service through a network of Hubs in the Dallas Fort Worth (DFW) metro area. Under this plan, the company’s hubs would be located in the established parking lots of commercial areas such as shopping centres, large individual retailers, and shopping malls. DroneUp would operate 11 hubs initially, and a maximum of 30 hubs throughout the DFW area in the next several years.
The package delivery operations would be conducted with DroneUp’s PRISM V2 Series, which is electric-powered and has a maximum takeoff weight of 55 pounds. The PRISM drones have a delivery range of five miles from each hub and the maximum number of operations from each hub would be 500 flights per day. Each flight would take a package to a customer delivery address before returning to the hub.
DroneUp plans to conduct operations between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. local time, typically seven days per week including holidays.
After reviewing and analysing available data and information on existing conditions and potential impacts, the FAA has determined that DroneUp’s proposal “would not significantly affect the quality of the human environment” and that an Environmental Impact Statement is not required. The FAA therefore issued a Finding of No Significant Impact and Record of Decision.
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