The Department of Defense is authorized to use unmanned aircraft systems within U.S. airspace for more than a dozen different types of operations, from search and rescue to counterintelligence.
These domestic missions, and the official guidance or legal authority behind each of them, were tabulated in a newly updated manual on military support to civilian authorities.
See Appendix 1, Table 1 in Multi-Service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Defense Support of Civil Authorities (DSCA), ATP 3-28.1, February 11, 2021.
Overall guidance on domestic use of DoD drones was provided in a 2018 memorandum issued by then-Secretary of Defense James N. Mattis that is still in effect.
“The primary purpose, and large majority, of DoD domestic UAS operations is for DoD forces to gain realistic training experience, test equipment and tactics in preparation for potential overseas warfighting missions,” according to a cursory DoD website on the subject.
Achieving energy abundance requires reforming electricity markets, refreshing electric utility regulation and rethinking the way we pay for grid infrastructure.
Of course badly designed regulatory approaches can block progress or dry up the supply of public goods. But a theory of the whole regulatory world can’t be neatly extrapolated from urban zoning errors.
Congress should design strategic insurance solutions, enhance research and data, and protect farmworkers through on-farm adaptation measures.
If space is there, and if we are going to climb it, then regulatory reform must be a challenge that we are willing to accept, something that we are unwilling to postpone, for a competition that we intend to win.