A new Cork-based firm has developed the technology to monitor and measure tree growth, for factory forests

HOW DO you measure a tree? It might seem like a random question, but getting more accurate information about woodland resources could transform forest management, giving both profits and the environment a boost in the process. That’s according to Enda Keane, chief executive of Cork-based TreeMetrics, which has developed a new technology to literally see the wood from the trees: a laser-based system scans the trees, then software analyses the data to simulate and optimise how the resources could be used.

Their high-tech approach is a far cry from the current, hands-on method of measuring trees. “The standard for over 100 years has been to walk around the forest and use a calipers to measure at a height of 1.3 metres above the ground,” says Keane. “You measure the height of the trees and you get the average taper of the forest. But it assumes the trees are straight.”

The forester or sawmiller eyeballs the trees to judge the crookedness, but the poor quality of data that come out of such an approach has a substantial impact, he adds.

“Globally on average 20 per cent of the value of the forest is lost at harvest time around the world. They lose that value by producing waste and loss through bad decisions. It goes back to the old adage that if you don’t measure properly you don’t manage properly.”

A trained forester himself, Keane spotted the potential for laser scanning to measure the shapes of trees while working in the area of 3D graphics and in 2005 he co-founded TreeMetrics with Garret Mullooly.

Working with the University of Freiburg, they developed an approach where a forester simply puts the scanner on a tripod at a point in the forest, pushes a button and within three minutes the machine has built up 40 million survey points from the 360-degree surroundings. A sample is usually done per hectare, then software that simulates harvesting can make sense of it all.

“We have developed an automated software now so you can walk into the forest and measure the size and shape of trees for the first time, and from this information we can make better management decisions about the forest resource,” explains Keane.

“So you can cut the forest online, remotely in your office, without having to visit it. You can see where the forest has grown, where are the defects, where is the value.”

To optimise the software, the company worked with the Science Foundation Ireland-funded Cork Constraint Computation Centre (4C) at University College Cork, which partnered with TreeMetrics in Trio, an Enterprise Ireland project. The experts soon realised the forest was akin to a factory, and standard manufacturing techniques could be used to optimise it through the modelling and simulation software.

“It should be like any other factory, you have the raw material and you should be able to make what you want – so you have different amounts of logs and you should cut the forest to suit the demand,” says Dr James Little from 4C, who explains that knowing what’s in your forest puts you in a position to use the resources more profitably and sustainably.

The optimised software has been licenced to TreeMetrics and a new EU-funded project, Flexwood, is seeing TreeMetrics and 4C link in with European partners to further develop and validate the approach.

In practice, Keane sees clients using the machinery to scan forests, then send the data to Ireland for processing. That arrangement has already worked with a trial in Australia, and with relatively little forest coverage at home, Ireland is well placed to offer such an information-based service, he says.

“We are not seen as a threat by any other nation. In fact people get a good kick out of Irish foresters being the inventors.”

And what about the cost? “Forest measurement was always seen as a cost, but we turn information into value and profit,” says Keane, who argues that the bottom line will ultimately be what drives this kind of technology. “Clean tech is about making better use of the planet’s resources, but clean technologies have to offer profit, and without people liking it, it’s not going to succeed.”

As well as tightening forestry usage for business, the company also has its sights on environmental monitoring, particularly as the need to track deforestation is becoming more apparent, says Keane.

“People now realise how important forests are, but we really can’t say what impact climate change is having on forest health, vitality and growth because we really don’t know what we have out there in the planet,” he says.

“Now people are beginning to wise up to this and we believe there is truly an opportunity for an Irish company to become a world leader in the area of forest measurement and management.”

The company, which is hiring, recently won an IBM SmartCamp award and is starting to engage with VCs in Europe and the US.

“We have proven our technology now and we believe we can become the de facto standard for measuring forests around the world,” says Keane. “We have a global opportunity and we just need to grab it.”