he said. “Many GNSS correction services provide corrections using cellular phone connections. With RTX, cellular coverage isn’t needed. The correction data can be delivered via both phone and communica - tions satellites, so users can get accurate performance 24/7, even in remote locations.” Similar to their experience with the R1, Land Life developers used Catalyst to deliver the positions into their monitoring software. “It was easy to integrate Catalyst into our work,” Janmaat recalls. “The ac- curacy from Catalyst is displayed in combination with field data in our Android app.” Maintaining Control Land Life is already reaping the benefits of the accurate GNSS systems for monitoring. Janmaat described a project in Spain where they could compare the new and old approaches. “Two of us were there for two full days doing close to 20 hours of work each to monitor a thousand trees. With the Trimble system, you can do a thousand trees by yourself in one day, which has sped up monitoring by at least a factor of four.” As the forests grow, the monitoring will transition from ground-based measurements to using drones to capture data over larger areas. By us - ing accurate GNSS to locate the trees during planting and to maintain tight georeferencing for the drone flights, Land Life will be able to identify and monitor individual trees from the aerial images. Janmaat used data plots from a planting project in Texas to illustrate the contribution of accurate positioning to Land Life’s data-driven meth- ods. Trees planted using accurate GNSS appear in neat rows, while those planted using only a phone GPS are uneven and more scattered. The accurate positioning also enabled direct comparison of different treatments and watering methods to specific trees over time, including use of an automated watering solution in dry areas. The data enable Land Life to improve the performance and survival rates, effectively reducing the cost per successful tree. Looking forward, Land Life expects to use its GNSS capabilities to assist operators in guiding the planting machines, ensuring consistency and proper placement of trees. But monitoring will remain a core effort and a driver for increasing productivity and tree success rates. Janmaat is keen to share his enthusiasm and knowledge gained about technology in forestry and agriculture in general. He believes it pro- vides an interesting and exciting challenge for young professionals to implement technology that enables a for-profit company to contribute to society and the Earth, while having a positive effect on our environment. “We are doing technologically challenging stuff that we apply towards a sustainable goal,” he said. “We are confident this will reduce costs in the future and make us more effective in planting trees. Apart from the cost aspect, it also enables us to reforest parts of the earth that would otherwise be more difficult to recover. By developing our knowledge, we have greater understanding on which trees grow well in the various conditions. It enables us to work in areas where other companies might not succeed.”
Meeting the Needs Professional-grade GPS or GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite Sys- tem) receivers could easily meet the sub-meter requirements, but Land Life was concerned about the cost and complexity of those solutions. They had already invested in writing software for data collection and their field teams were familiar and efficient with those in-house apps. Land Life needed a way to blend higher accuracy positioning into their existing workflows and Bring-Your-Own-Device (BYOD) approach to locating and monitoring the trees. Land Life selected the Trimble R1 GNSS receiver, a device roughly the size of a pack of playing cards that can provide real-time positioning with sub-meter accuracy. Using a Bluetooth connection, the R1 can stream position data to apps running on iOS or Android smartphones, making it easy for field workers to carry and use. Land Life software developers incorporated the high-accuracy positions into their in-house monitoring apps. With the position data in their familiar apps, workers could use existing workflows and smartphones; they needed very little training on the new device. Land Life can also mount a R1 onto its tree planting machines, enabling field teams to capture the location of each new tree when it is planted. For monitoring, the app can then guide users to specific trees. “When you have that sub-meter accuracy flowing from the R1, it's easy to find your way back to a tree,” Janmaat said. “You walk towards the tree, you look on your phone and say, ‘Oh, yeah. I see the dot of my location on my screen next to the tree that I'm looking for.’ It works quite well.” Building on its experience with the R1, Land Life is also using Trimble Catalyst, which combines a small GNSS antenna with software running on an Android-based tablet or smartphone. By turning the smartphone into a GNSS system that can produce up to centimeter accuracy, the Catalyst technology further reduces the cost and complexity of accurate positioning. Like the R1, the Catalyst solution uses GNSS correction data from the Trimble RTX service to produce the needed sub-meter accuracy positions; Catalyst functions as an all-in-one GNSS position- ing service that can be subscribed to on a monthly or even hourly basis. According to Jasper Schurr, the commercial manager for Geometius, a Trimble distributor in the Netherlands, receiving correction data is essential. “The RTX service is important for users like Land Life,” A Land Life technician uses a QR code reader to identify a tree. By replacing the QR codes with accurate GNSS positioning, Land Life produced a four-fold increase in monitoring productivity.
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csengineermag.com
November 2021
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