Blackfoot_Watershed_Lidar_PWS.docx

Blackfoot Watershed Lidar Acquisition Performance Work Statement (PWS)

Tasks

1. Lidar and Aerial Imagery.

Acquire high-resolution Lidar (16ppm+) and high-resolution aerial imagery (~12-inch resolution) on 123,000 acres of forested areas to perform resources assessment in support of the Blackfoot Environmental Assessment at Watershed Scale (EWAS).

2. Quality Assessment / Quality Control Perform quality control of the Lidar cloud to remove outliers, ensure accurate return classification and spread, as well as provide the greatest quality elevation and surface models for road, stream, and topography use.

3. Field Validation Stratify the landscape and designate locations for an estimated 250-350 field-validation locations (plots) following Lidar acquisition and pre-processing.

4. Resource Assessment and Analysis.

Resource assessment of the project area includes compilation of all Lidar flight data, aerial imagery, field validation data, and analysis to support outyear land management planning and annual operation planning processes for resource at the Missoula Field Office. This Lidar, aerial imagery and assessment is intended to support resource areas across the field office including but not limited to Forestry, Fuels, Recreation, Engineering, Archeology, Weeds, Wildlife, Fisheries, Realty / Rights of Way, Hydrology / Soils, Recreation, Geology and GIS / Cartography.

Deliverables

1. High resolution Lidar: the Lidar will be flown to a quality level (QL) exceeding QL0 with a Pulse Per Square Meter of at least 16ppsm. Aerial imagery will be acquired simultaneously at a level of approximately 12-inch resolution. The Lidar cloud data will be provided to the BLM in compressed .LAZ v1.4 tiles 500m x 500m in size. Aerial imagery will be provided as raster files compatible with ESRI GIS at 30cm (12”) resolution.

2. Digital Elevation Models (DEMs), Digital Surface Models (DSMs), and Canopy Height (CHMs) will be provided as raster files compatible with ESRI GIS at 30cm (12”) resolution.

3. Canopy Closure, Dead Tree locations, and Landscape change: Through analysis of the DEM, DSM, and CHM products landscape-scale mapping is completed to identify canopy cover, canopy density, ground vegetation densities, and potentially sensitive and/or specific features of note as identified by the BLM (e.g., habitat / vegetation correlations). These products are delivered as raster files compatible with ESRI GIS and vary in resolution from 30cm to 20m cell sizes.

4. Stream and Road Analyses: The Lidar point cloud and initial mapping products will be combined with imagery to develop GIS streams and roads layer files. Deliverables are a “blue line” streams GIS layer, and “brown line” roads layer as updated by the Lidar. These layers will contain stream slope and road slope in ¼-mile segments, as well as an estimate of stream shade, from canopy cover, for ¼-mile segments of the streams layer. Road name/ number, stream name and similar will be attributed to segments as supplied by the BLM.

5. Wildlife Habitat / Forage Ratio: Through canopy cover and imagery analysis, use the structure stratification from the Lidar data to provide thermal cover (tree density/size maps) and forage ratio raster files at resolutions requested by BLM. Provide vegetation density (total above-ground vegetative) and tree-species pattern mapping to indicate where forest conditions provide desired habitats or may require restoration efforts to achieve wildlife management goals. The results of these analyses will be provided in ArcGIS compatible raster format. Throughout the analysis work with the BLM to review outputs, identify changes or modifications that can increase the value of each product for their specific application, and determine additional analyses that may be of interest to meet their resource vision.

6. Single-Tree Analysis for forest inventory. Deliverables included are: tree species, location, height, DBH, crown diameter, gross tree volume, and forest structure (social order) classification provided in a GIS compatible file type (shapefile or geodatabase layer file). Throughout the analysis work with the BLM to review outputs, identify changes or modifications that can increase the value of each product for their specific application, and determine additional analyses that may be of interest to meet their resource vision.

7. Stand Mapping and Silvicultural Analysis: subdivide the landscape into small polygons which preserve the forest variability and allow for the characterization of forest conditions at high resolution. Establish or update delineation of timber stands across the project area. Update as needed following application of the BLM’s silvicultural prescriptions to the landscape for each stand digitally using forest modeling software to update the forest inventory from the condition of when Lidar were collected to the date of delivery to account for treatments and/or fire etc. “Grow” the trees using forest modeling software forward from the date of Lidar collection to the date of product delivery. Provide Stand level metrics including species composition, gross volume in MBF, basal area, average height, max and min heights, average diameter.

8. Forest Health Analysis: Combine high-density Lidar data and multi-band imagery to assess vegetation changes, species, and mortality to estimate above-ground biomass. Separate these measures into estimates by modeled species and calculations of standing dead tree volume. The deliverable from this analysis will be a raster layer of biomass and standing dead tree conditions at resolution as requested by the BLM.

9. Deliver all Lidar cloud data, DEM tiles, CHM tiles, roads layer, streams layer, wildlife habitat/forage ratio raster, forest health raster, and the forest inventory as GIS compatible files, as well as forward-projected growth of the forest inventory to cover the year of delivery. Host the data and deliverables on a cloud based webservice provided by the awardee for BLM use, up to five years from award. Provide a hard drive with all products to BLM for their own use prior to contract termination.

10. All deliverables become the property of the BLM upon completion.

Acceptable levels of quality.

1. The Lidar will be flown to a quality level (QL) exceeding QL0 with a Pulse Per Square Meter of at least 16ppsm. Aerial imagery will be acquired at a level of approximately 30 cm (12”) resolution.

2. Field Validation will consist of 250-350 field-validation locations (plots).

3. All Lidar cloud data, DEM tiles, CHM tiles, roads layer, streams layer, wildlife habitat/forage ratio raster, forest health raster, and the forest database files will be compatible with the BLM’s current GIS systems (ArcPro).

4. Each deliverable will be reviewed and discussed with the BLM’s contracting officer representative (COR) during periodic meetings scheduled throughout the life of the contract to communicate progress and explain details on product development workflow.

Timeline

1. All deliverables will be due to the BLM within 24 months of award. Flights, post-processing, field validation and all analyses must be performed in such way as to provide deliverables within the period of performance.