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Description
The global timber market is estimated at $ 600 billion, estimated to grow four times by 2050. At the same time, illegal logging causes an estimated $ 5 billion worth of damage each year. Timber is the input to wood industry, where it accounts for more than 50% (ca. 70% of sawn timber production) of total costs. Despite the high share of timber costs in the production of wood, too little attention is today paid on making the timber production process more cost-effective through the implementation of new methods and digital solutions.
The general objective of the Green ICT project is to develop a full-scale smart, machine-learning and computer-vision based algorithm, enhancing the functionalities of the current, base-line solution, enabling to measure the timber raw material ten times faster, five times cheaper and three times more accurate as compared to current industry standards. The ambition of Timbeter is to become a standard in the industry as a certificate of measurement and origin and to approach global markets with the product. As a result of the business innovation project, the Timbeter solution with its’ key functionalities has been developed, tested and validated with a set of early stage customers and is ready for wide commercialisation and fast market uptake. Main target group include forest owners and forestry in general.
Summary of project results
Project was targeted to development of a solution that could help timber logistics companies to get a transparent overview of the movement of the trucks in real-time and in retrospect, optimize and use the already available smart-device sensor data to track and export data in a way that would dynamically suit the needs of various customers. Following outcomes were achieved by the end of the implementing period:
- API methods to track truck measurements from their starting point until the destination. All truck routes are saved in the database and can be viewed in real-time and in retrospect.
- Web application views to manage, handle and view Truck Measurement routes, to edit the truck measurements and export the related data.
- The architecture to export various reports to fit the client''s needs.
- Android capabilities for tracking the truck measurements in the background. * Automatic timber stack detection on trucks from the side. Where users don''t have to manually mark the heights of the truck packages.
- A third-party sensor capability to measure the truck heights without any need for a physical reference on the level of the timber.
All planned goals were achieved. The new solution enables to calculate the exact CO2 emissions of the trucks and to optimise the logistics to reduce emissions. In total, 5 new jobs have been created during the implementing period with total of 25 600 tons of CO2 equivalents of CO2 emissions reduced.
Summary of bilateral results
Partnership proved to be valuable to the Project Promoter, cooperation has been smooth and operational. The main results in bilateral level are the increased value creation and knowledge on the solution specific needs in Norway. Bilaterl cooperation is likely to continue.