'Kinda cool' laser mapping a game changer for surveying northern landscape

Laser technology is helping a team of researchers gather more detailed information about the North's changing landscape.

The team from the University of Lethbridge installed a state-of-the-art laser system in an airplane late last month, starting their research in northern Ontario before heading to Yellowknife this week.

"It's just an amazing landscape," said Laura Chasmer, anassistant professorin geography. "There's so much diversity in the landscape that we can look at."

The system emits laser light pulses to create three-dimensional topographical maps, chartingeverything from vegetation heights, changes in permafrost and depth of lakes and rivers.

It's been an eyeopener for the researchers.

Chasmer said the most prominent change she's noticed is lake levels, particularly after the N.W.T.'s extremely dry summer the last couple of years.

"We have these small ponds and lakes where you're basically seeing no water in them anymore."

But curiously, some lakes are maintaining their water levels.

"Other lakes we're seeing are just fine, and to capacity," Chasmer said. "So this is quite interesting to us because we're wondering why these things might be changing and what's causing that."

Regeneration around massive wildfire burns is another thing the researchers are noticing, as well as declines in permafrost.

"Where it thaws out, all the trees around the edges of the permafrost are dying and these are being converted into wetlands," Chasmer said.

Laser system a game changer

Research chair Chris Hopkinson has been surveying the territory since 2000, and says a lot has changed since then, noting the high rate of permafrost thaw, the death of trees and changes to the ecosystem.

He says the new laser system is "much more sophisticated" than what they used in the past.

"It's much higher resolution, much faster repetition rates, so we can make over a million measurements per second so that's kinda cool. But in addition, it captures data in three different dimensions," Hopkinson said.

He said it's a new way to monitor ecosystem health, so he's calling it "ecosystem diagnostic imaging."

"Putting these three wavelengths together allows us to kind of colourize the landscape, as we would with a photograph, except we see different things than a traditional photograph would see."

The two-week mission will also bring the team to Fort Smith, Norman Wells and Fort Simpson, then they'll return to Alberta to survey near Fort McMurray, Slave Lake and the Calgary area.

"It's very exciting. Every time you go up in the plane and you turn the laser on, you're learning new things whether it's quirks with the system or just seeing new things in the data," said Hopkinson.