Development of an Integrated Drone–IoT Framework for Sustainable and Climate-Resilient Progress Monitoring and Quantity Measurement in Nigerian Construction Projects

Author

Yabani Galadima Gelwasa, Bello Ayuba Dorh

Abstract

  Construction progress monitoring and quantity measurement in Nigeria remain predominantly manual, time-consuming, and vulnerable to the disruptive effects of an increasingly volatile climate, including flooding, extreme heat, and erosion. This paper reviews the empirical and conceptual literature on unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV/drone) applications, Internet of Things (IoT) sensor networks, and climate resilience strategies within the Nigerian construction sector to propose an integrated drone–IoT framework for climate-resilient progress monitoring and quantity measurement. Drawing on eight empirical and review sources published between 2023 and 2026, the paper finds that UAV adoption on Nigerian construction sites remains low (approximately one-fifth of surveyed professionals in one case study), despite evidence that adoption measurably accelerates project delivery. The paper identifies technology- and organisation-related factors as the most critical drivers of UAV uptake, while regulatory ambiguity, security concerns, and staff resistance are recurring barriers. Separately, the reviewed climate literature documents substantial projected reductions in the service life of common Nigerian building materials under current climatic trends. The paper proposes a four-layer conceptual framework, comprising field data capture (drone and IoT sensors), connectivity and edge processing, cloud data fusion and analytics, and decision-support reporting, through which drone-derived volumetric and progress data can be fused with continuous ground-based IoT sensing to support both physical progress tracking and climate-risk early warning. The paper concludes that while the constituent technologies are individually well-documented in the Nigerian context, an empirically validated integrated drone–IoT framework has not yet been reported, and sets out directions for its future development and field validation.

Keywords

unmanned aerial vehicles; Internet of Things; construction progress monitoring; quantity surveying; climate resilience; Nigerian construction industry

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References

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