The Scion Rural Fire Research Team and inFact Ltd have developed a slash-pile temperature monitoring system that can send real-time temperatures to the internet via a satellite – allowing slash-pile temperatures to be monitored from a phone.
In logging operations, the process of creating logs from trees produces debris – sawdust, broken branches and logs, needles and slovens. This debris builds up on the processing area and is swept into a debris pile. Over time the debris pile decomposes into soil but occasionally decomposition results in the pile spontaneously combusting.
This new monitoring system gives forest managers a real-time picture of the temperatures inside slash piles. It also lets us monitor the thermal behaviour of the piles with changing weather conditions.