Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. We are major proponents of digital technologies and the opportunities that they enable. FWPA’s new project is one such project where a centralised database for private forestry information in Australia is being set up. It will include data on historic and current trials and highlight the valuable lessons leant for forest management. The data …
A single source of information for private forestry
Forest & Wood Products Australia (FWPA) is developing a single, centralised database for private forestry information through a national project to collect and collate information about commercial farm plantations, private native forests and Indigenous managed forests around Australia.FWPA’s Chris Lafferty said the project presents a significant and unique opportunity. “So much work has been undertaken, through funded programs or by …
NASA releases new forest biomass-carbon product
NASA’s GEDI mission has reached a major milestone with the release of its newest data product, which provides the first near-global estimate of aboveground forest biomass and the carbon it stores—filling a key gap in climate research. The data enables research into how Earth’s forests are changing, what role they play in mitigating climate change, and the regional and global …
GOES 18 weather satellite launched
Whether it’s wildfires that sweep across the West Coast, storms rolling in from the Pacific Ocean or dense fog that blankets the Pacific Northwest, a new weather satellite will be able to track them all. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration launched GOES-T, the third in its series of advanced geostationary weather satellites, at 4:38 p.m. ET Tuesday from Cape …
Rocket Lab catches falling rocket booster
Rocket Lab successfully catch falling rocket booster with a helicopter. Rocket Lab has successfully caught one of its Electron rocket boosters, using a helicopter, as it parachuted back towards the Pacific Ocean after launch.But shortly after the capture, the pilot noticed the helicopter was behaving differently than it had in testing, and for safety the booster was dropped into the …
Scientists fight to keep Lidar on Space Station
A controversy is brewing between remote sensing scientists and administrators from NASA and the agency’s international partners. The debate centers around how long the Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation (GEDI) lidar system will continue to operate from the International Space Station before the system is decommissioned and left to burn up in the atmosphere. Since 2019, scientists have used GEDI to …
The Best Consumer Drones for 2022
Drones have become an essential tool for forestry companies over the last decade. Technology continues to evolve and many consumer drones are now incorporating some of the advanced imaging, video stabilisation, control and automated features previously seen in more specialised (and expensive) models. PC Mag has just released a detailed breakdown of the best consumer drones for 2022. While you …
The Many Different Faces of Lidar-based Survey Methods
Thanks to sensor miniaturization, laser technology is available for surveying and mapping professionals in many different guises nowadays. This selection of articles highlights the diversity of Lidar as a flexible tool for capturing the environment. From backpacks to handheld scanners and from drones to helmets, this type of remote sensing technology can be mounted on almost any device imaginable, resulting …
ForestTECH News | Issue 56
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. We have a tonne of interesting videos this month. We have several from the recent ForestTECH event which highlighted mechanised planting developments, technologies and trials. A summary of presentations can be found in our first article below. Other videos include autonomous drones under the canopy, a short film on tree planting in Canada and …
Tech advancements and trials with mechanised planting
The second day of the just-completed ForestTECH 2021/22 event focussed on advancements in automated silviculture with a particular focus on mechanised planting operations – new technology, developing technologies and an insight into results from local forest trials and commercial planting operations. In short, like Europe and South America in particular, the cost and availability of labour for planting have both …
Early EOI to present at ForestTECH 2022
Despite continued Covid related disruptions to the running of the annual ForestTECH event, ForestTECH 2021-22 ran, albeit virtually as an on-line event on 23-24 February this year. Over 300 delegates from 15 different countries were registered for the event. Feedback has now been collated and the response from those involved, excellent. Feedback from delegates also very clearly told us that; …
Telstra starts carbon farming to offset emissions
Telecommunications giant Telstra is starting its own carbon farm, growing trees to reduce its emissions. Big polluters that want to move towards net zero emissions need to buy carbon credits to offset what they put into the atmosphere. But not enough carbon credits exist in Australia, so Telstra boss Andy Penn is becoming a farmer. “A carbon farmer,” he laughed. …
Autonomous drones fly through forests
Expert human drone pilots have proven incredibly adept at piloting UAV through complex courses at high speeds which are still unmatched by autonomous systems. But researchers at the University of Zurich and Intel Labs are collaborating to change that, and their work, recently presented in the journal Science Robotics, could have far-reaching implications for the future of commercial drones. “Autonomous …
A prototype forest monitoring framework
From a forest biosecurity perspective, there is growing interest in forest surveillance processes capable of providing information on foliar disease present within the planted estate. Monitoring strategies often rely on aerial surveys to provide this information; they are, however, infrequent and only cover a small proportion of the forest estate. In this article, we present the results of a collaborative …
Celebrating tree planting – with a film festival
“Tree planting transforms us. These are our stories.” On 19 March The 2022 virtual Tree Planting Film Festival entitled We Are the Landscape, provided an inside look into what it takes to be a tree planter in Canada, sharing stories of passion, purpose, and perseverance. It featured 26 short films and documentaries, each under 10 minutes in length, as well …
Shopify purchases carbon offsets from DroneSeed
Reforestation company DroneSeed has announced its largest sale of offsets to date to Shopify, a leading provider of essential internet infrastructure for commerce, which is on a mission to reverse climate change. As part of the post-fire reforestation, native trees of multiple species will remove 50,000 tonnes as they grow over the next century on a legally protected site. A …
The Digital Forester: thoughts from a Canadian forester
Adam Dick is a Science Advisor at the Canadian Wood Fibre Centre, Canadian Forest Service and joins us from Fredericton. Adam was one of the champions that brought lidar enhanced forest inventory (EFI) to New Brunswick, which has resulted in the province having wall-to-wall lidar coverage and EFI predictions. From academia, to industry, to provincial and federal government roles, Adam …
Treeswift using drones to monitor forests
Over the past decade, drones have become an increasingly important tool for forest monitoring. They’re a fast and effective way to collect a lot of data in one go, without upsetting the natural balance too much. Formed as a spinoff of the University of Pennsylvania’s GRASP Laboratory in 2020, Treeswift has been working to build out that promise. Founders Steven …
Covid – the tipping point for automation?
Critical labour shortages are the catalyst for companies to finally automate and boost our decades-long productivity stagnation On December 19, 2013 a 20-year-old Levin man, Lincoln Kidd, was crushed to death by a falling tree – the 10th forestry worker in New Zealand to die in a single year; the 27th in four years. Forestry was setting the wrong sort …
ForestTECH News | Issue 55
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. Firstly, thanks for your support and buy-in to the reformatted ForestTECH 2021-22 a week or so ago. Initially scheduled for November 2021, the outbreaks of Delta and Omicron made it impossible to run the event live in Rotorua. Instead, all stops were pulled out in the two weeks leading up to 23-24 February to …
Government funding for Victorian forestry research
Victoria’s forestry industries are set to benefit from five new research projects funded by the National Institute for Forest Products Innovation (NIFPI) centre in Gippsland. Federal Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries Jonno Duniam, and Victorian Minister for Agriculture Mary Anne Thomas congratulated the funding recipients and welcomed the benefits these projects will bring to Gippsland and the wider industry …
Australia’s forest restoration tactics re-evaluated
• More than 24 million hectares (59 million acres) burned during Australia’s devastating “Black Summer” bushfire season of 2019-2020, which formed part of a confirmed climate change-driven trend of worsening fire weather and larger, more intense forest fires. • Scientists are still assessing the extent of the damage and are calling for a greater focus on understanding the effects of …
New Biomass Carbon Monitor launched
The Biomass Carbon Monitor provides global maps of annual change in carbon stocks held in forest biomass Forests and vegetation play a major role in removing CO2 from the atmosphere. The Biomass Carbon Monitor, just launched, is the first geospatial platform to provide information about regional biomass carbon changes, which can be used as to track net gains and losses …
Geospatial trends & developments
How is the geospatial industry evolving in today’s turbulent times? What are the trends and developments in the sector, and where is the business heading? Read the findings from GIM International’s recent annual industry survey for the answers to these and other questions. And needless to say, there is much more to discover in the latest edition of GIM International’s …
Monitoring planting using AI and remote sensing
Scion data scientists working with remote sensing experts Indufor have developed a new commercial service to monitor forest establishment and indigenous forest fragments. New Zealand will need to plant forests at unprecedented rates for decades to come if the country wishes to achieve its carbon neutrality goals and develop a renewable and sustainable bioeconomy. Successful establishment of newly planted trees …
Technology to make Australian forests smarter
The latest episode of FWPA’s WoodChat series of podcasts takes a deep dive into some exciting Australian projects focused on the fusion of forestry and technology to help shape and strengthen the forests of the future. Listeners are invited to discover how scientists are working to make smarter, healthier and more productive forests, utilising everything from Artificial Intelligence (AI) to …
Tools For Foresters initiative launches new website
It was quite a fitting week with the Australasian forestry industry celebrating 15 years of ForestTECH, Australasia’s premier annual forest technology conference running on 23-24 February – an event that has enabled and empowered our industry with game changing technology – to officially launch the new Tools for Foresters website. It was launched as part of the Remote Sensing Cluster …
Changes for Australian forest reporting?
This ABARES Position Paper identifies drivers for change in the mechanism of forest reporting through Australia’s State of the Forests Report (SOFR), including increasing user expectations for access to current forest data, and access to information and analysis in digital, online formats. Three major options are then presented to respond to these drivers: status-quo five-yearly reporting; online-only five-yearly reporting; and …
ForestTECH News | Issue 54
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. This is the first issue of 2022 and how things have changed since we last corresponded. Omicron has been an unwelcome game-changer in Australia. While the worst may be over, the big issue for business has been chronic worker shortages in key industries across the country. Companies reported that 20% to 50% of workers …
ForestTECH 2021/22 is now a virtual online event only
The growing outbreak of omicron in New Zealand has resulted in the upcoming ForestTECH 2021/22 moving to a completely virtual online event. It will still be run on 22-23 February 2022 and open to all New Zealanders, Australians and the wider international community. Current registrations, which number well over 260, have all been transferred to the online event. While FIEA …
The drone industry in 5 years’ time
When I registered the company name Australian UAV in early 2103 the landscape for drone technology was very different to that that we work in today. There were 35 ReOC holders in Australia (at time of writing this article there are now 2437). To become an operator, you needed to complete and pass the private pilot’s licence exam and CASA …
New radio technology keeps workers safe and compliant
Otago forestry workers are using new radio technology to manage 23,730 hectares of forest more safely, even enabling them to perform under Covid-19 restrictions. Initially deployed to replace an outdated analogue radio network, the system delivers many additional benefits for forestry company, City Forests. Among those benefits are contact-free communication and social distancing in the field, replacing the news for …
Development of a canopy sampling drone
This video is part of the paper, “Design and Testing of a Novel Unoccupied Aircraft System for the Collection of Forest Canopy Samples,” by researchers from the University of Tasmania and Melbourne’s Victoria University. Funding was provided by FWPA and the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment.
Upscaling of Terrestrial Laser Scanning through fusion with remote sensing data
Terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) is increasingly being fused with air/spaceborne Lidar to characterise vegetation structure across a range of forest ecosystems. This article explores the potential of this approach to support scaling up for larger areas in practice. TLS is an important tool for plot-scale measurements of tree and forest structure. These local measurements are meaningful to support the quantification …
New biomass mapping tool launched
Mapping the world’s carbon stores is essential for taking stock of the climate crisis. It informs our climate solutions, the emissions targets’ that countries set and so – it goes without saying – the figures need to be as accurate as possible. It’s not an easy picture to take, however. Humans are constantly upsetting the amount of carbon in forests, …
Longest endurance UAV flight in NZ
Media Release [21 Dec 2021]: Kea Aerospace Achieves Longest Endurance UAV Flight In New Zealand On Sunday 19th December Kea Aerospace has recorded the longest known flight for an unmanned aircraft in New Zealand, in an electric-powered flight above Kaitōrete, near Christchurch. The battery and solar-powered vehicle flew non-stop for 14 hours and 3 minutes, beating the previous record of …
New farm forestry program launched
Tuesday marked the official launch of a new, innovative farm forestry program, Decision Tree, in Bunbury, Western Australia. Decision Tree has been designed to rapidly assess the suitability of farms for plantation forestry, as well as provide information and assistance to landowners seeking to plant trees. Through Decision Tree’s unique assessment tool, farmers or landowners simply add in a few …
UAV’s for collecting forest canopy samples
Last year we detailed a forest canopy sampling tool that was developed by a Canadian company, DeLeaves and is being used operationally, principally in North America and Europe. Suspended under an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), the sampling tool is self-powered, equipped with an HD camera, and has two robotic arms there to grab and cut foliage samples from trees. As …
Bushfire spread prediction model now operational
Australia’s national science agency CSIRO and the NSW Rural Fire Service have released Australia’s most advanced model for predicting the speed and behaviour of eucalypt forest fires, helping to save lives and property during bushfires. Eucalypts make up more than 70 per cent of Australia’s forests and some of Australia’s most extreme fire events, such as the 2009 Black Saturday …
ForestTECH News | Issue 53
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. As 2021 comes to a close, it’s been a year where Covid-19 has once again dominated the headlines, disrupted supply chains and threatened business as usual. However, it has also been a boom for many within the forestry industry, as increased domestic construction and reopening of international trade has seen timber in high demand. …
Glyphosate’s economic and environmental Benefits
Food and pasture growers as well as the forestry industry rely on glyphosate to prevent deep-rooted weeds from taking over their crops and decimating productivity, according to a report by the NZIER on the benefits of glyphosate to New Zealand. The world’s most widely-used weed management tool has extensive economic and environmental benefits. It enables farmers and growers to deliver …
TreeMapper App developed for farm foresters
Private Forests Tasmania and the Forest Practices Authority have developed Treemapper, a farm and forestry property planning app. The ‘Property Planning Mapper’ mobile application will deliver a handful of mapping and calculator tools to provide immediate farm-planning benefit for landowners, consultants, planners, contractors, and land agents. This will improve the easiness of planning, mapping, and managing properties to expand the …
Changes for Australian forest reporting?
This ABARES Position Paper identifies drivers for change in the mechanism of forest reporting through Australia’s State of the Forests Report (SOFR), including increasing user expectations for access to current forest data, and access to information and analysis in digital, online formats. Three major options are then presented to respond to these drivers: status-quo five-yearly reporting; online-only five-yearly reporting; and …
Major study to assess erosion and sediment control
Safeguarding New Zealand’s waterways is the key driver behind a seven-year study into the performance of control practices for reducing erosion and sediment delivered to rivers from forest harvesting. The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) has partnered with forestry company OneFortyOne New Zealand, providing NZ$1.37 million through its Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures fund to the NZ$3.6 million project. The …
Ernslaw One announces NZ forest sales
Ernslaw One and its advisor Cranleigh Partners have announced that Ernslaw has completed an agreement to sell the Whangapoua and Ruatoria forests with a combined area of 15,100 productive hectares to Summit Forests New Zealand Limited. Yong Tiong, Executive Director of the Oregon Group, the parent company of Ernslaw One, said this was a significant step forward in executing Ernslaw’s …
ArborGen to sell Australia and NZ assets
Tree seedling company ArborGen has agreed to sell its New Zealand and Australian assets to a consortium led by Hugh Fletcher for $22.25 million. ArborGen is one of the last remnants of the former Fletcher Forests, and has a range of nurseries producing seedlings for the timber and agriculture industries. The company disclosed in June that it was undertaking a …
Software unveiled to forecast bushfire damage
Revolutionary Bushfire Management platform leverages multiple data sources and climate change-adjusted fire weather projections to predict rate of bushfire spread and intensity, fuel loads and preparedness levels. The platform has already drawn interest from government agencies and asset owners in the Energy, Telecommunications, Mining & Resources spaces, with a number of trials already successfully completed and more underway. Queensland-founded global …
ForestTECH News | Issue 52
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. A lot can happen in just a month. As you many of you will have heard, due to New Zealand’s current covid-19 outbreak and current restrictions on travel and running events, we have needed to reschedule ForestTECH 2021. Now rebranded ForestTECH 2021/22, this event will instead be held 23-24 February 2022 in Rotorua, New …
New Videos added to Video Showcase
In the lead up to ForestTECH 2021/22, we will be adding new videos to our ForestTECH News Video Showcase page. This page already has over 50 forest technology videos and is one of our most popular resources. This month we have added an on-demand Planet webinar on forest management and another from TerraLab on tracking weed management.
Planet’s Rapid SkySat Data Enables Effective Regional Bushfire Management In Australia
Civil governments around the world are making sustainable strides in local environmental management; and by using satellite-enabled data, they are able to analyze and support preventative management techniques to protect local communities and ecosystems. For example, Forest Fire Management Victoria, a governmental organization located in Victoria, Australia, leverages high-resolution tasking capabilities from Planet’s SkySat constellation to analyze its effectiveness in …
Stora Enso precision forestry innovations
As part of the eagerly awaited annual forest technology event, two key presenters from the European forestry giant, Stora Enso Oy will be presenting as part of ForestTECH 2021/22. The company is one of the largest private forest owners in the world with forestry assets valued at more than EUR 7 billion (land and forests). Globally, the company owns or …
Safe Use of Agrichemicals manual updated
Disease and pest free animals and crops rely on agrichemical use. Pesticides, detergents and sanitisers are a critical component of New Zealand’s NZ$48 billion agricultural sector. The recently released and updated ‘NZS 8409:2021 Management of agrichemicals’ provides guidance for spray operators, farmers, growers and other users to manage a range of chemicals safely, responsibly and effectively. Having undergone its first …
Postponement of ForestTECH 2021 event
After talking to presenters, exhibitors and delegates for this year’s eagerly awaited ForestTECH 2021 event that was planned to run on 23-24 November 2021, it has been agreed to postpone the event for a few months. The uncertainty still around the evolving Covid situation in New Zealand and safety concerns for those travelling into Rotorua to attend the conference, workshops and exhibitions …
STA Logger – Tracking weed management
The STA logger is an automated GPS and data logging attachment designed to integrate with your existing weed control tools.
Two pension funds acquire NZ forestry asset
Two European pension funds, APG Asset Management (APG) on behalf of its Dutch pension fund client ABP, and UK’s Pension Protection Fund (PPF), have agreed to purchase Sinotrans New Zealand Limited’s (Sinotrans NZ) shareholding in Wenita Forest Products Limited (Wenita). Wenita is the largest producer of timber in Otago, New Zealand, across almost 30,000 hectares of sustainably managed forests. With …
DroneSeed raises US$36 million
DroneSeed has announced it has raised US$36 million in its Series A funding round. The round was led by Social Capital and Seven Seven Six, with participation from new and existing investors. Part of these funds were used to acquire Silvaseed, a 130-year-old forestry company, to expand DroneSeed’s seed collection and seedling cultivation services. A pioneer in climate tech and …
ForestTECH News | Issue 51
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. We are now only 6 weeks before ForestTECH 2021 runs in Rotorua, New Zealand and virtually for our Australian and international delegates. As its been since early 2020, covid-19 continues to send curveballs. While the in-person Melbourne event was not able to happen this year, we have had a great response from New Zealander’s …
Using SilviScan technology for climate-impact research
SilviScan is a multifaceted technology comprised of an advanced suite of software and instruments including a cell scanner, x-ray densitometer, and x-ray diffractometer, which are used together to measure wood structure and quality that are most relevant to industry. This technology can measure the tiniest fibre dimensions within a tree and the data may then be used to map the …
Plan to plant a billion trees yet to take root
In September 2018, the federal government unveiled a plan to radically expand Australia’s timber plantations by one billion trees over a decade. Today, less than 1 per cent of that goal has been planted. “At this rate, forget hitting the 2050 target; it will take 357 years to hit a billion trees,” independent senator Rex Patrick told parliament. Despite the pledge …
Dawn joins NZ Gov’t programme to accelerate integration of remotely piloted aircraft
Dawn Aerospace has joined the New Zealand Airspace Integration Trials Programme (AITP). The news was announced yesterday by Minister of Research, Science and Innovation, Hon Megan Woods. The AITP’s mission is to: Realise the full potential of New Zealand’s existing regulatory regimes Accelerate the integration of remotely piloted aircraft that enable the development of innovative technologies Support research and development …
Free US$43m high-resolution imagery now available
In September 2020, the Norwegian Government announced a contract providing public access to high-resolution satellite imagery of tropical forests. Never has the public had open access to satellite imagery with such high spatial and temporal resolution. But what does this data windfall mean for forest monitoring? How will it contribute to our goals of reducing tropical deforestation and restoring forest …
Changes to forestry provisions in the ETS
Amendments to the Climate Change Response Act 2002 in June 2020 delivered a range of improvements to the NZ Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). These reforms aim to drive a substantial increase in afforestation, reduce operational complexity and improve ease of compliance for forestry participants. Most of the new forestry provisions will come into force on 1 January 2023 and apply …
Recognition for bushfire safety contributions
It was an interest in trees, not fires that set CFA Deputy Chief Officer Alen Slijepcevic on a path that led him around the world where he is today found leading the bushfire management portfolio of one of the world’s largest volunteer fire services. Along the way, his work has had an enormous impact on the way bushfire risk and …
EnviroSatTools: A collaborative satellite data workspace
The past 50 years have seen rapid changes across landscapes, with forests and wetlands alike converted for agricultural use or, conversely, re-afforested due to policy or economic drivers. While official land use maps often exist, they only provide a static, point in time snapshot that quickly becomes dated. This limits their use for agencies responsible for environmental monitoring and protection …
How much data is required for AI?
There are many situations where data is not available in the quantity desired, but you don’t need to wait for the ideal scenario to get started with AI. You can gain valuable insights from AI even when working with limited data. We know that data is the fuel for AI. But how much data do we need to create an …
ForestTECH News | Issue 50
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. We hit a major ForestTECH News milestone this month, with September 2021 being our 50th issue. After more than a decade of running the major annual forest technology series ForestTECH and two decades of publishing the weekly Friday Offcuts enewsletter, in 2017 we launched the monthly ForestTECH News. The aim, based on feedback and …
Radically different Transwing eVTOL design offers some huge advantages
Southern California’s PteroDynamics has somehow escaped our attention thus far, but this company’s radically different take on the electric VTOL aircraft is well worth a look, and the company claims this will be the most efficient design by far. The Transwing is an entirely different concept to anything else in development. It uses a unique (and patented) folding wing design. Propellers …
DroneDeploy snaps up NZ robotics company
US-based enterprise drone data company DroneDeploy has acquired Rocos, a New Zealand-based robotics software company, in a move that will allow its customers in construction, energy and agriculture to deploy both aerial and ground robots on job sites. The San Francisco company creates software for to allow users to operate drones with mobile apps. The deal with Rocos will allow …
DroneSeed acquires major forestry seed supplier
Driven by Increasing Demand for Reforestation in the Face of Wildfires & Climate Change, Acquisition of Silvaseed Co. Positions DroneSeed as Vertically-Integrated Leader in Reforestation DroneSeed announced that it has acquired Silvaseed Company, a 130 year-old titan in the forestry seed collection and seedling supply business. The move expands DroneSeed’s reforestation services beyond aerial drone-based seeding to span seed collection, …
Drone based LiDAR services extended with DJI Zenmuse
2021 continues to be a leap forward in drone-based UAV LiDAR at Interpine. To complement their two Emesent Hovermap LiDAR units they have also recently purchased the DJI Zenmuse L1 LiDAR + RGB solution for the DJI Matrice 300 RTK. Simultaneous collection of high-resolution 20MP 1-inch CMOS RGB camera with Livox LiDAR module and high accuracy IMU provides a solution …
Large-scale UAV-Lidar survey in the tropics
With a total length of 2,789km, the Trans-Sumatra Toll Road Project is one of Indonesia’s National Strategic Projects and the longest toll road project in Southeast Asia. In order to keep the project on track for the scheduled completion date of 2024, UAV-Lidar was chosen as the topographic data acquisition method, combined with building information modelling (BIM), to optimize the …
Using drones for early bushfire detection
According to the NSW Fire and Environment Summary, about a quarter of New South Wales’ best koala habitat were burned in the bushfires. Other areas of Australia are also not untouched by this tragedy. In Victoria, bushfires have destroyed koalas reserves and other endangered habitats leading to heavy losses of flora and fauna. Forest officers and environmentalists are having a …
Minimising spray drift in forestry operations
As outlined in a recent issue, this year’s ForestTECH 2021 programme being run in Rotorua, New Zealand on 23-24 November will be built around two main themes. The first is remote sensing, data capture, GIS, mapping and forest inventory technologies and the second, forest establishment, mechanised planting and silviculture. Much of the planting focus this year will be on the …
App for bushfire prediction
USC researchers will develop a citizen science app for people living in fire-prone areas to help predict the likelihood of bushfires in Australia and minimise their devastating effects. The University has been awarded an Australian Government Citizen Science Grant of almost AU$500,000 to design and implement the app, called NOBURN (National Bush Fire Resilience Network). Citizen scientists from around the …
ForestTECH News | Issue 49
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. We start this month with the sale of 24,000ha of Green Triangle forests, located on the border of Victoria and South Australia, to AXA IM. This is their first Australian forestry investment and one of the largest in recent times for the South Australian timber industry. Gresham House, the UK’s largest commercial forestry manager, …
Ecologists compare accuracy of lidar technologies for monitoring forest vegetation
As light detection and ranging (lidar) technology evolves, forest ecology and ecological restoration researchers have been using these tools in a wide range of applications. “We needed an accounting of relative accuracy and errors among lidar platforms within a range of forest types and structural configurations,” said associate professor Andrew Sánchez Meador, executive director of NAU’s Ecological Restoration Institute (ERI). Sánchez …
Scanning the forest from the ground, the air and from space!
For many years, Dr Christine Stone of the NSW Department of Primary Industries has been leading research projects around the use of remote platforms equipped with various types of sensors to capture high-resolution data that will aid forest management. The technology has become operational in plantation forestry in support of research assessment and planning and detection of animal habitats. It …
CSIRO opens satellite offering for Aussie Earth observation
This will mark the first time Australia has managed its own source of Earth observation data, contributing to the growth of the nation’s space industry. The satellite can take images of the Earth through all weather conditions, including heavy cloud and smoke, offering a valuable data advantage to the many industries now harnessing the estimated $2.5 billion in economic benefits …
UK forestry manager to manage Australian estate
Gresham House is pleased to announce that it will be appointed as asset manager for a 24,800-hectare Australian forestry investment, Green Triangle Forest Products (GTFP), which AXA IM Alts has agreed to acquire, subject to regulatory approval, on behalf of clients. Gresham House also acted as the advisor for AXA IM Alts in relation to this transaction. The appointment as …
New entrant secures 24,000 ha of Australian pine
Investment house AXA IM has taken control of 24,000 hectares of pine plantations straddling the border between Victoria and South Australia in a $775 million deal with US fund manager Global Forest Partners, the biggest timber transaction in the country for more than a decade. The acquisition is the first investment in Australian forestry for AXA IM, which manages almost …
The Digital Forester Podcast: Murray Woods – Treedimensions
Murray Woods, Principal Consultant at Treedimensions, shares his experiences with and thoughts about airborne, terrestrial and hand-held lidar, single photon lidar, lidar enhanced forest inventories, area-based vs. individual tree-based lidar inventories, best practices for field sampling for lidar inventories, whether lidar can remotely sense age and much more.
Seed-dropping drone being trialed
A New Zealand team hopes a drone dropping thousands of seeds over the Hūnua ranges could provide a boost to native reforestation efforts. RNZ reporter Louise Ternouth and cameraman Nick Monro were there for its launch. If the trial works, the drone-testing team say New Zealand could be progressing on the government’s ambitious goal of 1 billion trees planted by …
Lidar Crop Classification with Data Fusion and Machine Learning
A recent South African study created crop type maps using Lidar, Sentinel-2 and aerial data along with several machine learning classification algorithms for differentiating four crop types in an intensively cultivated area. Crop type maps are frequently generated using remotely sensed data acquired by sensors mounted on satellites, manned aircraft or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs or ‘drones’), the most popular …
Mechanised planting technologies being profiled
Editor’s Update: Since posting this story, ForestTECH 2021 has been rescheduled and is now being held on 23-24 February 2022. Last year, for the first time since the ForestTECH series began back in 2007, the annual forestry technology update run for New Zealand and Australian forestry companies and delegates from another 20 countries, covered new technologies around forest establishment, mechanised …
ForestTECH News Issue 48
Welcome to the latest issue of Foresttech.News. The big news this month for the ForestTECH community is the release of the ForestTECH 2021 programme and the opening of early registrations. As mentioned last month, due to Covid-19 and the uncertainty around Australian lockdowns, the event will be held in-person in Rotorua, New Zealand on 23-24 November 2021. It will also be …
ForestTECH 2021 programme now out
Every year one major forest technology series is run in this region. It’s designed by and for Australasian forestry resource managers, inventory foresters, researchers and tech developers. It’s the one event every year where remote sensing, GIS, mapping and forest inventory specialists, and for the first-time last year, tree crop and silvicultural managers – get-together. It’s independent. It’s run by …
AFRY acquires Simosol Oy to become a global leader in digital forestry
AFRY has acquired Simosol Oy, a Finland-based company that specialises in advanced simulation and optimisation solutions for forest and agricultural assets. The acquisition is in line with AFRY’s ambition to become the global leader in Smart Forestry digital services and solutions. AFRY Smart Forestry offering developed by AFRY Management Consulting creates value through combining AFRY’s forest value chain expertise and …
Woodsat wooden satellite completed a successful stratospheric flight
WISA Woodsat wooden satellite completed a successful stratospheric flight on Saturday 12 June 2021, when a test model of the satellite was sent on a flight from Heureka Science Center at Vantaa, Finland. The main purpose of the test flight was to trial the systems of the satellite and especially assess the crucial boom camera functions. The balloon carrying the …
AI tool for forestry sequestration attracts backing
Nelson Artificial Intelligence (NAI), a provider of artificial intelligence (AI) solutions for thorny environmental challenges, has spun off its first business after securing a NZ$1.8 million investment in technology that gives landowners streamlined access to forest carbon credit markets. Tauranga-based WNT Ventures has backed the spin-off, CarbonCrop, to compete globally in the large and growing market for carbon sequestration management …