What is Nirwood

What is Nirwood

NIRWOOD focus on a smart and transparent timber trading. It will be the first technological system able to identify on-site the quality and the origin of wooden products, using NIR technology. We will do it in an easy and cost-affordable way.

The system can be used by producers (pre-delivery checks) and customers (reception control) and by Authorities in their control function.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nir Technology Milestones

 

 

 

 

 

Transcribe data from the torch to the data base

 

The need

Timber traders voiced an urgent need not appropriately covered today: an easy on-field technique to determine timber species, its origin (legality) as well as timber quality. Their main objective is to avoid fakes and penalties derived from illegal wood trade.

GEA Forestal created NIRWOOD, that will be the first commercial system for on-site identification of quality and origin of wooden products, based on Near-Infrared Technology (NIR). Our target is to put in the market a simple, accurate, fast and low-cost solution to ascertain wood species and origin to solve illegal trade and quality fakes.

Europe and the illegal timber trade

Timber Trade Nirwood

Wood traceability assurance is a major point of weakness for the European Woodworking companies. Nowadays only through slow and expensive laboratory tests it is possible to differentiate certain wood species. The guarantee of its geographical origin is just based on documentation that could have been easily manipulated. In fact, illegal logging represents 19% of the total wood products imported in the EU. This is why the European Commission (EC) approved the European Timber Regulation (EUTR – Regulation 995/2010) to combat this issue. Due to the new regulations, those Woodworking companies exposed to quality and origin frauds during trade and transport operations, may turn into the loss of 100% of their wooden products transported.

The NIRWOOD solution

NIRWOOD objective is the creation of a huge timber spectral database. It will include NIR spectra from protected species as well as the most commercial ones. Once after the project is finished, we will periodically update the database with new species. All data will be treated to create a mathematical algorithm and it will allow us to identify a certain species and its origin. This is what we call the NIRWOOD prediction model. The algorithm will be embedded in a cloud-based platform easy to access by everyone, everywhere. Its accuracy will make possible to ascertain wood species and origin instantly just by using a portable NIR device that scans the timber on-site. It will avoid economic losses caused by frauds.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 767007