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THE SWEDISH FOREST AGENCY
To fight the spruce bark beetle, you need to identify infested spruce trees at an early stage. Together with Combitech, the Swedish Forest Agency has taken up the fight – from space – with the help of AI.
In recent years, Swedish forest owners have acquired a small but formidable opponent. The spruce bark beetle is only four millimetres long but has still managed to kill over 30 million cubic metres of spruce since 2018. It causes significant economic damage and destroys the forest, which is key to the climate transition.
The trees provide renewable raw materials and act as natural carbon sinks. Accelerating climate change has made the situation worse; warmer temperatures allow spruce bark beetles to reproduce more times per season and attack more trees.
To fight this tiny saboteur, you need to find ways to identify infested spruce trees at an early stage. Together with Combitech, the Swedish Forest Agency has taken up the fight against the spruce bark beetle from space – with the help of AI.
Fighting something as analogue as a beetle, from space using AI, feels very special. This is a great example of how technology can make a difference and contribute to a better society
The mating ritual of the spruce bark beetle is a complicated story, to say the least. It takes place in several stages and lasts for weeks. Eventually, the beetle and its larvae will have eaten away at the bark of the spruce tree, leaving the tree so damaged that it struggles to recover and is sold as firewood instead of being put to better use.
However, the spruce bark beetle has a weakness – it is predictable! It returns to the same areas to mate. By studying aerial photographs, it’s possible to identify which trees have been infested in previous years. But these photos are taken only every two years, making it difficult to pinpoint affected trees in time. Instead, help is being sought from space.
By examining infrared and visible wavelengths in satellite images, it is possible to identify areas infested by spruce bark beetles as often as every three days. However, the resolution is too low to identify individual trees.
This is where AI and Combitech come in.
I'm good at AI, but not in all the areas that you can apply AI to. I have learnt so much about the forest and spruce bark beetles during this project. It is very instructive to work with other experts who know completely different things than I do. Together, we can build something bigger than what we could have done individually.
Using change analysis where images from different dates are compared, trees with low chlorophyll content can be identified. As a result, the Forestry Commission and forest owners can detect damaged tree groups in time and implement measures to prevent neighbouring trees from being affected.
It took modern AI technology and assistance from space, but it looks like the spruce bark beetle has finally met its match.
This is a very interesting project from a purely technological perspective. It feels great to use my skills for something that has such a clear benefit, not only for me and society at large but for the whole planet.
