How drone technology is revolutionizing the Forestry industry

Overview:

The forestry industry presents a myriad of challenges for organizations operating within. This has resulted in major enterprises seeking out innovative and efficient ways to monitor, inspect and improve safety of their operations. Many have realized major benefits from the adoption and implementation of recent improvements in UAV technology and the changing government regulations to accommodate.

Challenges:

The sheer size of natural forestry land makes projects extremely labour intensive resulting in time-consuming, tedious and often dangerous tasks for crew. Furthermore, manually estimations are prone to inaccuracies that compound into large expenses that ultimately impact the bottomline.

Challenges facing the forestry industry:

Inaccessibly land and terrain: danger to crew.
Sampling estimates: inaccurate data.
Vast plot sizes: labour and time intensive to inspect and monitor.

Solutions:

Drone and sensor technologies are being implemented by organizations today to mitigate these challenges, but most importantly make accurate data driven analysis and decisions.

Operators are able to efficiently assess acreages of remote forestry land from a single vantage point: drastically reducing the need for labor and time consumed from traditional methods.
LiDAR and imaging sensors accurately reproduce the forestry environment in 3D formats such as: photogrammetry and point-cloud.
Powerful analytical software can: extract metrics such as tree heights, diameter, volume, and counts.
Technology enables repeatability and automation which allows for: active monitoring, precision and up-to-date data.

Application:

Our team has found successes working with industry professionals, using DJI Matrice 600 drones and Green Valley S200 LiDAR sensors.

Candrone Lidar California Fire department

Candrone and Green Valley team worked with the California Fire Department, using drone and LiDAR technology to map and assess vastly forested lands. The fire department was able use the data to proactively plan fuel breaks that would traditionally require intensive labor and expensive manned-aircraft operations.

Candrone and researchers from the University of British Columbia (UBC) used LiDAR data to supplement their research on the ecology of streams and the effects on the surrounding forestry environment. We set out to the vast natural forests in Port Alberni, BC and were able to collect data from over 50 acres of inaccessible forestry land.

Technology:

DJI Matrice 600
DJI Matrice 200 V2
Green Valley LiAir S220
Green Valley LiAir S250
Green Valley LiAir-V
DJI Zenmuse X7 Camera
DJI Zenmuse Z30

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