Innovation
Mountainous forests comprise some of Europe’s most stunning, yet inaccessible landscapes. A comprehensive understanding of such remote terrain is thus integral to their exploitation as timber resources. Technology pioneered by a regional initiative will re-map these environments, supplying foresters with detailed resources to make critical business decisions.
Hi-tech surveillance of alpine forests to improve sustainable forest management
Under an EU regional funding initiative – INTERREG IV Alpine Space –mountainous geography has been identified as a joint theme for research, undertaken by several member states. Granted a 130 million Euro budget, the Alpine Space Programme seeks “to overcome the disadvantages of location factors and to promote the Alpine Space as a dynamic economic region in Europe”. Running from 2007-2013, one specific industry targeted for economic rejuvenation under its auspices is forestry which, in such climes, is subject to distinct strategic vulnerabilities. “Mountain topography introduces some
major problems” explains Jean-Matthieu Monnet, a French participant in NEWFOR (NEW technologies for a better mountain FORest timber mobilization), a project entering its second year. Steep gradients, cliffs, unpredictable weather and sinuous road systems all pose hazards, which are frequently difficult to negotiate. “Consequently, it’s expensive to acquire information about these regions. Low accessibility makes it difficult to accurately estimate volumes, or species of trees. Large vehicles used in forestry processes, and for mobilising felled wood for export, also face varied obstructions”. Cable cranes (systems
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of pulleys and line wires, linked to a tractor), skidders (tractors used to pull pole-length timbers across the ground) and forwarders (vehicles used to carry logs) are the most common methods of retrieval, but all have limited range, and need infrastructure to support them. Without data on which decision makers can
base their strategies, the region’s assets run the risk of becoming uncompetitive – or negated altogether. “Over the past decades,
enterprise.” Each partner
© Stand Montafon
sylviculture, labour and harvesting costs have increased” comments Monnet. “Managers are very conscious of efficiency. If timber costs are outweighed by the expense of extraction, entire areas may be abandoned by
country
(Austria, France, Germany, Italy and Slovenia) contains mountainous regions of between 10-150 thousand square kilometres, with forest proportions between 45 and 67% and faces surprisingly familiar concerns.
Forest height model
calculated from lidar data (50m x 100m area, colors from blue=ground to
red=highest trees).
Triangles represented the detected
dominant trees. © Irstea
Insight Publishers | Projects
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