This article was originally published prior to the founding of Eocene and the information included here represents events and news that occurred under our company subsidiaries.
June 29, 2023
Our environmental division worked closely with Idaho Power on a transmission line project. The line stretches from southern Idaho up to eastern Oregon and includes many different projects happening simultaneously.
Idaho Power needed a firm to perform timber cruising for this line. Timber cruising is the process of examining forest inventory and boundary lines, assess the amount of water, check for any wetland delineation, audit the general condition of the property, examine the geography of the land, and make note of any obstacles within the forest.
Typically, cruising is used to obtain a volume estimation to appraise and prepare timber sales. In this case, Idaho Power required a timber cruise to help them determine monetary offers for property owners whose timber would be impacted by the new line build.
Our environmental division collaborated with our forestry & utility division to serve Idaho Power’s needs. Once things were finalized from the contract perspective, the real work began. One of our consulting utility foresters (CUFs) lives in the region and has extensive timber cruising and forest management experience from his past job working with and for his father in their small business. Our CUF was happy to accept this challenge and played a very crucial role in coordinating and executing our first-ever timber cruising project.
Our team spent many hours viewing software demos from various suppliers, and eventually working with our selected vendor to customize the chosen software further. Because this was not a traditional timber cruise, the software had to be tweaked to support the unique needs of each property. When the software was finalized, we were able to start cruising!
Each week, as our team cruised properties, we worked closely with the property owners to secure access for the CUF onsite. This project lasted from August to December 2022. All properties with secured permission have been cruised. Our team may return to a few outstanding properties when permission is granted.