The Maritime College of Forest Technology’s, Department of Continuing Education is pleased to offer Introduction to LiDAR Based Enhanced Forest Inventory (EFI), Terrain and Surface Products for Forest Professionals with Riley Côté-DeMerchant as lead instructor. The dates are February 20th & 21st, 2017 beginning at 8:30 AM each day. The course will be held in room 224 of the Maritime College of Forest Technology, Fredericton, New Brunswick. Specific course details including an instructor profile, application form, and tuition costs are included in the course registration form (link at end of article).

As LiDAR accessibility continues to increase, more industries are adopting the technology and discovering its practical and cost-saving applications. Resource industries including forestry, mining, and energy, are using LiDAR to increase efficiencies and lower operational costs. These industries are continuously discovering new ways to manipulate and apply data to better their operations, such as discovering watercourses and previously undetected structures and growth patterns.

Much like the GIS, LiDAR has the potential to revolutionize the forest industry. The availability of LiDAR derived Enhanced Forest Inventories has recently become more common and available across many land bases in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, presenting forest professionals with an unprecedented amount of relevant data.  The available information ranges from basic tree height, to more complex and detailed inventory attributes such as diameter distribution of stems throughout a stand. Further, EFI provides highly detailed information on the ground, including elevation data, percent slope and, and accurate hydrographic information.

To download the course announcement, please click here.