ISCN Global Mixer: Ultra-early detection of wildfires

Forests are under tremendous distress. In Germany, only every fifth tree in forests is still healthy. The past years have seen many heat records and several big and escalating wildfires which are only adding to the menace. As many urban areas around the world are in fact surrounded by forestry and enjoy the resources, protection and other multiple benefits it provides, the smart-city-approach has to investigate how to extend and use its capacities for forest protection as well.

In this ISCN Global Mixer, Pedro Silva, Chief Technical Officer of Dryad Networks demonstrated how extended IOT-sensoring on trees can achieve an ultra-early detection of wildfires. 

He presented various options for detecting forest fires, such as camera- and satellite-based solutions. Dryad has developed another solution: ultra-early detection with gas sensors. These sensors are solar-powered and can detect wildfires in the smoldering phase when no fire has broken out yet. In principle, it is important to detect forest fires within the first 60 minutes and take action to prevent serious damage. The sensors detect the "smell" of a composition of different gases that is typical of forest fires. When detected, messages are sent via the gateways to the monitoring system, which in turn notifies the fire departments.  

Dryad developed the mesh network based on LoRaWAN technology to provide the best possible coverage of large and remote areas. Pedro emphasized that IoT networks in forests can be used for more than just detecting forest fires. Once installed, the system can be used for various use cases from monitoring the health of trees to detecting illegal activities in the forest, such as logging.