Technology for monitoring and inventory of forest resources based on laser location, digital aerial photography and satellite geopositioning

The use of the newest methods and technologies of airborne laser location, high resolution digital photography and the global positioning satellite systems, provides principally new opportunities for remote sensing monitoring and inventory of forest resources. High efficiency of laser location (more than 200 thousand pulses/measurements per second) in combination with centimeter spatial resolution of digital aerial photography, high (about 10-15 cm) accuracy for coordinate definition of trees and tree stands morphostructural parameters by satellite geopositioning systems, as well as three-dimensional visualization of the remote sensing data at geoinformation systems, allows to developing effective algorithms for research of forest resources structure and dynamics, guaranteeing a real time automatic extraction of forest inventory parameters. Development and application of such high-end technologies to aerospace forest monitoring is critical and essential for boreal zone and, in particular, for regions of Siberia, where traditional approaches of forest inventory to be used today are not effective, do not provide required accuracy and are highly timeand funds consuming.