BEYOND the Survey: Why Industry Leaders Are Making the Switch to ABSD LiDAR Solutions
- Clinton Bravo
- Sep 29
- 7 min read
LiDAR has moved from “nice to have” to “need to have” and the Philippines is a perfect use case. With projects spread across islands, steep terrain, dense vegetation, and frequent typhoons, teams need site data that is precise, fast to capture, and safe to acquire. That’s exactly what LiDAR delivers: rapid, centimeter-level 3D mapping that scales from Barangay roads to transmission corridors, from heritage churches to open-pit and underground mines. Global adoption has surged as falling hardware costs and better software turned LiDAR into a practical positive tool for engineering, construction, utilities, mining, agriculture, and transport work.
LiDAR measures millions of precise distances with laser pulses to create georeferenced “point clouds.” From those points, we build Digital Terrain Models (DTM), surfaces, and true-to-scale 3D twins. Airborne LiDAR (on drones or aircraft) covers wide areas and penetrates vegetation to map the bare earth. Here are three types of LiDAR variation for better understanding of their best uses:
Aerial LiDAR covers large or hard-to-reach areas ideal for mountain highways in the Cordilleras, river basins prone to flooding, landslide risk areas in Eastern Visayas, or post-typhoon corridor checks. It captures terrain even under light vegetation, enabling true ground models for drainage and slope work. This principle is also applicable in almost any survey scenario, such as our recent aerial and mobile topography survey conducted at NAIA Terminal 1. Full report of our recent project at NAIA, click this link.
Mobile LiDAR records dense 3D data while moving perfect for road inventories, rail rights-of-way, and urban streetscapes in Metro Manila, Cebu, and Davao, without lengthy lane closures. Click this link to see similar mobile LiDAR related projects done by ABSD.
Terrestrial LiDAR delivers millimeter-grade detail for buildings, bridges, industrial plants, and heritage restoration where static, ultra-high resolution is required. For example is ABSD's project where we scanned a monument to showcase the capability of the as-built laser scanner, particularly the FARO Focus3D X330, this monument was scanned, given the permission from the administrators of the Hall of the Recollects. In-detail scan of the monument was achieved, as seen from the images above. See full details of how ABSD scanned this monument, click this link.
What makes LiDAR so well-suited to our terrain?
Speed and coverage. Modern scanners collect up to a million points per second, so a corridor, floodplain, or slope zone can be captured in hours rather than days often at night or in low light when work windows open around traffic or airport schedules. That means post-event assessments (e.g., after a typhoon) can be flown or driven as soon as airspace and roads are safe, feeding rapid damage and debris-flow checks for LGUs.
Accuracy and penetration. Mapping-grade LiDAR typically delivers 1–3 cm horizontal and ~2–3 cm vertical accuracy, and the laser pulses see through vegetation to the ground key for Philippine riverbanks under coconut or mangrove cover, forested watersheds, and steep uplands where photogrammetry struggles. For hydraulic modeling, slope-failure screening, and road-right-of-way design, that means cleaner bare-earth DTMs, better cross-sections, and tighter quantities with fewer site revisits.
Safety and repeatability. Aerial LiDAR keeps crews off unstable banks and landslide-prone cut slopes; mobile LiDAR lets teams scan national highways and bridges from a moving platform instead of setting out targets in live traffic. Because these surveys are fast and repeatable, LGUs and project owners can establish seasonal baselines and monitor change ideal for tracking dredging efficacy, reforestation growth, or informal structures migrating into easements.
For full comparison of LiDAR vs Photogrammetry and/or Satellite Imagery click this link provided.
Disaster risk reduction & climate resilience - UP’s DREAM/Phil-LiDAR initiative proved LiDAR at national scale: river basins, flood extents, coastlines, and resources were mapped and rolled into LiPAD, which today serves national agencies and LGUs with downloadable elevation models and derived products. Those datasets are already used for land-use plans, evacuation routing, floodplain zoning, and infrastructure siting and they’re meant to be refreshed as conditions change. With modern airborne LiDAR, provinces can now re-survey priority catchments after typhoons to update debris-flow paths and levee profiles; cities can re-level drainage models after roadworks; and coastal LGUs can monitor subsidence and overtopping risks without waiting years for new contour data. Follow this full report link.
Transportation and urban expansion - Rapid road-widening, interchanges, and rail corridors need up-to-date clearances, slopes, and utilities. Mobile and terrestrial LiDAR deliver dense, corridor-wide point clouds that feed geometry, signage inventories, and clash checks—so DPWH contractors and concessionaires minimize change orders and lane closures. Frequent re-scans also help LGUs police right-of-way encroachments and illegal dumps that worsen flooding. Click this link, to see different ABSD transportation/urban expansion projects.
Utilities reliability & vegetation risk - Vegetation contacting lines is a leading cause of outages in storm-prone regions. Utilities worldwide are replacing patrol-only cycles with LiDAR-and-AI programs that quantify clearance, predict regrowth, and prioritize trims cutting vegetation-related disruptions by double digits while creating an auditable record for regulators and insurers. That same playbook fits Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao grids exposed to high winds and salt-spray corrosion. Read more about how we scanned highly vegetated areas, especially in difficult-to-reach regions. Click this link for more information.
Construction quality - On dense urban builds from hospitals to transit-adjacent mixed-use LiDAR reality capture reduces rework by catching misalignments early, and producing accurate as-built scanning. Also, it captures lane geometry, overhead clearances, and roadside features at speed, building a corridor twin that designers and site engineers can measure from the office. Click this link, to see different ABSD construction related projects.
Mining, quarries, and geo-hazards - Daily or weekly LiDAR scans of benches, portals, and stockpiles give managers immediate volumes, overbreak/underbreak, and slope-stability indicators without placing people near high walls useful for metallic mines and aggregates that operate through the rainy season. Similarly, LiDAR data can be used to determine not only the risks associated with a mine area but also the volume of ore present. This data is particularly crucial during the pre-development phase of a mine. Read this link article where LiDAR technology prevented a mine-roof collapse.
Here are some case studies of other nations adopting LiDAR technology to address challenges in various sectors.
Case Study 1: South Africa — Underground mining moves from slow, risky surveys to fast, repeatable scans
Barberton Mines adopted handheld/mobile LiDAR to capture underground workings daily, replacing time-consuming total-station shots. Scan time dropped roughly in half, enabling routine face mapping in 10–15 minutes for 300 m of tunnel, and freeing surveyors to analyze data instead of collecting it. Critically, a single operator with minimal training can scan from safer positions (even from a chairlift) while still producing geometry accurate enough for production, convergence checks, shaft monitoring, and reconciliation. Stockpiles that once required climbing and GPS sampling are now measured by simply walking a scanner around the pile improving inventory accuracy and reducing exposure.
Electric utilities on the U.S. West Coast and across Australia accelerated LiDAR patrols of transmission and distribution corridors after devastating fires. Airborne LiDAR now pinpoints vegetation encroachments to conductor level, supports risk-based trim cycles (using growth-rate models), and provides auditable 3D records for regulators. In the U.S., utilities spent about USD 8 billion on vegetation management in 2024 and increasingly use LiDAR+AI to get proactive; analyses note these tech-enabled programs materially reduce outage events. Operators also use LiDAR to model sag/clearances, verify ground and road clearances, and rapidly assess storm damage by comparing pre- and post-event scans.
Singapore built a full LiDAR-scanned 3D city model to underpin smart-city planning, asset inventories, and infrastructure decisions. Keeping that twin current with periodic LiDAR refreshes lets agencies and utilities simulate impacts (e.g., new works, traffic or flood scenarios) against ground-truth geometry, speeding approvals and reducing rework.
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