Forestry is an industry that operates on precision. We help optimize forestry fleets with our unique GPS tracking solutions.
A Significant Economic Driver
Forestry has been a key industry in North America ever since the first settlers landed on the east coast. In 2014, the country alone represented 28% of the global industrial production of “Roundwood”, which is the term for trees that have been cut down but have not yet been processed. As far as economic significance is concerned, the United States is the largest producer and consumer of lumber. However, the U.S. typically produces Roundwood, exports it for processing, and then imports the finished product to be used for construction. Meaning they break even in the forest product trade balance. Canada, on the other hand, has the largest forest product trade balance, totaling roughly $19 billion a year.
GPS Tracking in Forestry
To gather these resources for export. The logging industry uses various pieces of heavy equipment, from Log Loaders to Harvesters, Processors, and everything in between. To optimize processes and ensure environmental sustainability of natural resources, companies have been utilizing GPS in forestry for over 25 years with a high degree of accuracy and resulting in positive ROI. Global Positioning Systems in forest service and silviculture help optimize machine productivity, monitor asset health, track forest position, monitor vehicle travel patterns, and tally the number of vehicle passes to avoid excessive soil compaction.
Concerns arise however with the use of GPS under the forest canopy. Does a dense or heavy canopy influence accuracy of GPS tracking? The short answer is yes, but not to a significant degree this study found that the average position error under the extra heavy canopy was around 4.31m, and under a variety of canopy conditions the average is reduced to 2.52m. But collecting accurate positioning data is only half the story.
Cellular Data Transmission Problems
The transmission of that data from the device to the manager is equally important, or the data sits idly in the equipment or vehicle collecting virtual dust. Most GPS tracking companies provide devices that use a cellular network for data processing and transfer. This works great when you’re operation is located in, or relatively close to, a city centre or another high-traffic area that has great coverage. But this is not the case in forestry and logging, as operations take place in remote and mountainous regions. The mix of limited cellular towers, mountain ranges interfering with signals, and dense forests blocking reception make the transmission of real-time GPS data via cellular networks unreliable at best and impossible at worst.
Cellular/Satellite GPS Tracking
Titan GPS addressed this issue with the development of our Dual Mode GPS tracking and equipment tracking satellite devices. The Dual Mode is an excellent tracking solution for the forestry industry due to the utilization of the Iridium satellite constellation. Iridium has the largest commercial constellation with 66 cross-linked low Earth orbit satellites. When forestry equipment travels outside of the cellular network, the Titan GPS unit activates the Iridium satellite constellation and compensates for the lack of cellular coverage. This allows Forestry Engineers and Project Managers are able to monitor vehicles and assets, even in remote locations accurately.
Titan GPS is dedicated to finding the perfect tracking solution for your needs, our Fleet Tracking Specialists work with you to tailor a solution for location monitoring, data collection, keeping tabs on forest inventory, Bluetooth connectivity, and more. Book a demo with our team to learn about our solution.
