Gazprom Neft: Introduces Aerial Scanning of Forests to Monitor Safety at Fields
Gazprom Neft carried out aerial laser scanning of 120 hectares of forest tracts at oil fields in the Orenburg Region and Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, on the basis of which it compiled digital terrain models. With the help of these models, eco-safe routes for the movement of special equipment in hard-to-reach areas of forests have been developed, excluding the felling of trees. The widespread use of this approach will allow the company to ensure the safety of forests during geological research.
Digital models of territories showed a high level of recognition of the position in space of each individual tree with its characteristics (species, height, thickness). The new approach further increased the level of environmental safety of geological and seismic exploration of oil reserves and minimized the costs of their implementation.
The advantage of digital forest scanning is the versatility of the data obtained: they can be used by different companies and government organizations. This is especially true in a situation where information about the forests of Russia is often available only from maps of the middle of the last century. Modern digital models are able to provide more up-to-date information about the forest, the location and species of each tree, as well as the number of trunks per unit area.
Further approbation of the technology is planned by Gazprom Neft with the participation of experts from the Federal Forestry Agency of the Russian Federation at one of the oil fields in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug. In the future, the development of a database of digital models of forest areas can help strengthen state supervision over their safety and the development of the forest industry.
