Adoption of Digital Aerial Photogrammetry in Forest Planning: A Case Study of Canavese Forestry Consortium, NW Italy with Technical and Economic Issues

Enrico Borgogno-Mondino, Samuele De Petris (), Filippo Sarvia, Evelyn Joan Momo, Fabio Sussio and Paolo Pari
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Enrico Borgogno-Mondino: Department of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences, University of Turin, L.go Braccini 2, 10095 Grugliasco, Italy
Samuele De Petris: Department of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences, University of Turin, L.go Braccini 2, 10095 Grugliasco, Italy
Filippo Sarvia: Department of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences, University of Turin, L.go Braccini 2, 10095 Grugliasco, Italy
Evelyn Joan Momo: Department of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences, University of Turin, L.go Braccini 2, 10095 Grugliasco, Italy
Fabio Sussio: DigiSky S.r.l., Strada Vicinale della Berlia 500, Turin Aeritalia Airport (LIMA), 10146 Turin, Italy
Paolo Pari: DigiSky S.r.l., Strada Vicinale della Berlia 500, Turin Aeritalia Airport (LIMA), 10146 Turin, Italy

Land, 2022, vol. 11, issue 8, 1-20

Abstract: The forestry sector has been significantly affected by the recent advances in geomatics. Photogrammetric aerial acquisitions provide full coverage of forests, making possible a wall-to-wall mapping of the main forestry key variables, such as tree height and tree density, needed for forest planning and management purposes. This work summarizes the role that digital aerial photogrammetry (DAP) is expected to have in the forest planning context and analyzes the main products from DAP that are significantly required. According to their technical features, some strategies are proposed to program acquisitions in order to consciously set operational parameters needed for obtaining accuracy of measures compliant with forest planning requirements. Admitting that, in most cases, forest planners externalize DAP acquisitions to flying companies, the authors propose simple strategies for making an ex-post evaluation of flight conditions through a conscious processing of the external orientation parameters of images resulting after the bundle adjustment. Theoretical aspects are exemplified with reference to a practical case study relying on an aerial acquisition that, in 2019, the Canavese Forestry Consortium (NW Italy) made to support the ongoing redaction of its new forest plans. Finally, some economic concerns are presented to demonstrate the capability of this technique to absorb the most of costs associated with ground surveys, especially when large areas have to be investigated. In particular, about 66% of cost savings were found when comparing DAP-based forest mapping to traditional forest inventory strategies.

Keywords: aerial photogrammetry; forest plan; forest inventory; photogrammetric points cloud; ortho-mosaic; product requirements in forestry (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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