NAMPA, Idaho — Northwest Nazarene University students are using artificial intelligence and laser mapping to help the U.S. Forest Service understand how wildfires could move through a forest and whether prescribed burns are reducing the available fuel.
The Forest Service has awarded the Nampa university an additional $122,000 to expand work already underway. NNU says its agreement with the federal agency runs through 2031.
Dale Hamilton, chair of NNU’s Computer Science Department, said the research can help forest managers determine how an area should be treated before a wildfire begins. That could include thinning trees, conducting a prescribed burn, or using both approaches.
“We did the prescribed burn. We’re now confident that if a fire comes through on a red flag day in August, it’s going to remain a surface fire,” Hamilton said.
WATCH: See how NNU students are using LiDAR and artificial intelligence to study wildfire fuel and help the Forest Service prepare for future fires
A surface fire burns vegetation along the ground. A crown fire reaches the tree canopy, where flames can spread between trees.
Students are using LiDAR to study those conditions. The technology works similarly to radar but uses laser pulses to measure the landscape. Millions of measurements taken from the ground and air can be combined into a three-dimensional map stretching from the forest floor to the top of the canopy.
On one scan of the Tamarack area, NNU student Ethan McCabe demonstrated how the distance between trees could influence the path of a crown fire.
“If a crown fire started up here in these lands, it’s gonna have way less distance to go than if a crown fire starts down here because all these trees are right next to each other,” McCabe said.
McCabe is also using artificial intelligence to calculate crown bulk density, which measures the amount of burnable material within the tree canopy.
“So then we’re trying to get at, what does this translate to? How much is going up in smoke, and how long can it last?” McCabe said.
Students collected data from 20 plots in the Payette National Forest before prescribed burns. The researchers plan to compare those measurements with data collected after the sites are treated to determine how the burns changed the forest’s fuel load.
The newest funding also expands NNU’s role in Forest Service training. Education faculty are working with subject-matter experts to improve how new tools and techniques are taught to agency personnel.
One planned training module will show Forest Service fuel specialists how to operate a terrestrial LiDAR unit valued at approximately $30,000 and process the forest scans it produces.
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