ALBERT

Description: Forest managers are faced with complicated road construction and deactivation decisions. When construction, upgrading, and deactivation strategies must be determined simultaneously over broad spatial and temporal scales, the problem becomes very complex and decision support systems are needed. In this paper, we report the development and application of an optimal road class and deactivation model using dynamic programming. We tested our model on projected road networks on Hardwicke Island, British Columbia. Sensitivity of inputs such as construction costs, upgrade costs, hauling and maintenance costs, deactivation costs, length of time horizon, discount rate, and haul volume were tested within and between two road networks. Comparison of road networks revealed that haul volume concentration, average haul distance, and total road length are the most important variables that affect road class decisions and total network costs. Within our case study, the road network with the lowest average hauling distance resulted in the lowest total cost (CAN$0.24/m3 less), because hauling costs are the largest component (46%) of total transportation costs. The dynamic programming model can be used to assess numerous road construction and maintenance assumptions under various silviculture and harvest systems.

Description: Manually designing road networks for planning purposes is labour-intensive. As an alternative, we have developed a computer algorithm to generate road networks under a variety of assumptions related to road design standards. This method does not create an optimized road network, but rather mimics the procedure a professional might use when projecting roads by hand. Because many feasible road networks are possible, sensitivity analysis is required to choose the best ones. Such analysis gives forest planners additional information with which to assess the long-term consequences of road density and road standards common in forest management decisions. The procedures used to create road networks are presented in this paper, along with a sensitivity analysis of assumptions on total network length, percentage of landings connected, grades, and horizontal and vertical alignment for a case study. We also include a sensitivity analysis of spatial detail such as node density and link characteristics. Although the road network generation algorithm requires manipulation of many input parameters to create desired road networks, and variation between outputs is a concern, the method still offers considerable improvement over manual methods, especially for applications in strategic planning, and appears to be suitable for all types of topography and road standards.

Description: Wildfires are a common disturbance in boreal regions and have the potential to affect the waterborne export of organic matter and nutrients from burned catchments. To understand the effect of fire on shallow groundwater chemistry in a forested peatland in northern Alberta, Canada, shallow groundwater monitoring wells were sampled before and after a prescribed burn. The samples were collected from control and treatment wells between May and August 2019. The results indicate no differences in dissolved organic matter concentration and chemical composition between wells in burned and unburned sections but substantially increased nutrient concentrations were found in the burned section. Here, the levels of phosphorus increased and did not return to pre-fire levels at the end of the monitoring period, while the levels of inorganic nitrogen increased and returned to pre-fire levels within a few months. With increasing wildfire activity, or as a result of prescribed burns in the Boreal Plains, we may see implications for downstream water quality, including lake trophic status.

Description: A significant portion of the forest harvesting in the cooler regions of North America occurs in the winter when the ground is frozen and can support machine traffic. Climate change may influence the cost of forestry operations by reducing the period of winter access in those cold regions. In this study, we examined the impact of a shortened period of frozen ground conditions on logging operation and costs. To adapt to shorter period of frozen soil conditions, logging contractors might need to provide more machines and labor to complete logging in a shorter period of frozen conditions. The objectives were to calculate the costs of logging operations of a hypothetical forestry company in Alberta, Canada under two conditions: first, when the wood was hauled to the mill directly; and second, when part of the wood was hauled to satellite yards close to the logging area, thereby minimizing the annual number of idle hauling trucks. General Circulation Models were used to predict future winter weather conditions. Using the current type of harvesting machines and hauling directly to the mill, the unit cost of logging operations ($/m3) was projected to increase by an average of 1.6% to 2.5% in 2030s, 2.8% to 5.3% in the 2050s and 4.8% to 10.9% in the 2080s compared to the base year of 2015–2016. With use of satellite yards during the winter logging, the total logging cost will increase over direct haul, by 1.8% to 2.8% in the 2030s, 3.1% to 5.7% in the 2050s and 5.2% to 11.4% in the 2080s. Using satellite yards, however, will provide year-around employment for hauling truckers and more consistent and reliable hauling operations.

Description: We compared median runoff (R) and precipitation (P) relationships over 25 years from 20 mesoscale (50 to 5,000 km2) catchments on the Boreal Plains, Alberta, Canada, to understand controls on water sink and source dynamics in water-limited, low-relief northern environments. Long-term catchment R and runoff efficiency (RP−1) were low and varied spatially by over an order of magnitude (3 to 119 mm/year, 1 to 27%). Intercatchment differences were not associated with small variations in climate. The partitioning of P into evapotranspiration (ET) and R instead reflected the interplay between underlying glacial deposit texture, overlying soil-vegetation land cover, and regional slope. Correlation and principal component analyses results show that peatland-swamp wetlands were the major source areas of water. The lowest estimates of median annual catchment ET (321 to 395 mm) and greatest R (60 to 119 mm, 13 to 27% of P) were observed in low-relief, peatland-swamp dominated catchments, within both fine-textured clay-plain and coarse-textured glacial deposits. In contrast, open-water wetlands and deciduous-mixedwood forest land covers acted as water sinks, and less catchment R was observed with increases in proportional coverage of these land covers. In catchments dominated by hummocky moraines, long-term runoff was restricted to 10 mm/year, or 2% of P. This reflects the poor surface-drainage networks and slightly greater regional slope of the fine-textured glacial deposit, coupled with the large soil-water and depression storage and higher actual ET of associated shallow open-water marsh wetland and deciduous-forest land covers. This intercatchment study enhances current conceptual frameworks for predicting water yield in the Boreal Plains based on the sink and source functions of glacial landforms and soil-vegetation land covers. It offers the capability within this hydro-geoclimatic region to design reclaimed catchments with desired hydrological functionality and associated tolerances to climate or land-use changes and inform land management decisions based on effective catchment-scale conceptual understanding. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.