At the Boyarka Forest Research Station, staff from the Development and IT Department of SFE “Forests of Ukraine” conducted training on the use of a mobile LiDAR laser scanner
Over the past two years, our specialists carried out field trials of laser‐scanning capabilities using equipment supplied by a specialized company. These trials were conducted in both coniferous and deciduous stands. We confirmed that this technology enables accurate modeling of forest‐stand structures and compared the performance of various types of LiDAR scanners.
This year, the enterprise purchased its own scanning equipment.
At the Boyarka Forest Research Station, a separate unit of the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine (NUBiP), employees of SFE “Forests of Ukraine” demonstrated the significant capabilities of laser‐scanning technology with simultaneous tree mapping (SLAM) in pine stands.
– The technology enables the identification of all trees with a stem diameter of 2 cm or bigger.
– Data processing in specialized software makes it possible to determine timber volume, the height, and diameters of individual trees, as well as the average stand height with 100 % accuracy.
– The use of a handheld laser scanner replaces several traditional instruments at once, such as a caliper, measuring tape, altimeter, and photo-video documentation tools. Scanning a 0.5 ha pine stand with LiDAR took 15 minutes, whereas measuring tree diameters over the same area using a caliper required over an hour. This will shorten the duration and reduce the cost of forest inventory operations.
– Automated timber‐volume assessment eliminates human error and prevents unaccounted timber.
– A single person operates the handheld laser scanner, whereas traditional forest inventory methods require a team.
“We are currently finalizing a methodology for conducting operational forest inventories. Scientists from NUBiP provided us with inventory data for plots that we surveyed using mobile laser scanning. Once we process the scan results in the specialized software, we will compare them against the reference data and develop an algorithm to calculate the key metrics needed for our operational activities,” says Olha Moroziuk, Manager of the Digitalization and IT Systems Development Division, Development and IT Department, SFE “Forests of Ukraine.”
Immediately upon completing the research and developing the software‐use algorithms, the equipment will be deployed in our branches. We also plan to procure an airborne laser‐scanning system. By combining 360° ground imagery with aerial scanning, we will generate a highly accurate digital 3D model of the forest massif.