This blog is part of a series of quick looks at conceptual use cases for Sancho - an AI Analytics App for Executives - across a wide array of traditional industries and activities.
The Amazon is one of the most biodiverse places in the world, with over three million species and 2,500 tree species (or one-third of all tropical trees that exist). Located mainly in Brazil, the Amazon covers nearly seven million square kilometers and stretches out to Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and five other South American countries. Unfortunately, due to the plethora of natural resources its size has been diminishing at an astonishing rate. About 17% of its forests have been destroyed over the past fifty years. Rampant deforestation in the area has not shown any signs of slowing with 2019 seeing the highest record of loss. There is no single direct explanation for deforestation. Causes range from wood extraction to agricultural expansion.
How does this affect you? Deforestation accounts for 15% of global greenhouse gas emissions. These emissions contribute to rising temperatures, changes in patterns of weather and water, and increased frequency of extreme weather events.
There are countless startups rising up each year to combat deforestation. Remote sensing is one of the main tools they utilize. Remote sensing is the scanning of the earth by satellite or high-flying aircraft (like drones) to obtain information.
A major issue arises with remote sensing for deforestation: there’s an enormous amount of data. Sorting through terabytes of data to find signs of deforestation activities is difficult. Once deforestation is detected, the operators of the remote sensors need to synthesize their data and notify stakeholders on the ground with a general location. It is usually too late by the time they get to the site. In order to minimize the time it takes for remote sensing operators to notify teams on the ground, the middlemen (operators) need to be eliminated.
Enter Sancho: As a mobile data analytics app, Sancho is constantly analyzing and synthesizing data. Operators could function as workgroup admins and upload their remote sensing data. Since operators collect daily data, all they need to do is set up automated uploads to Sancho. Teams on the ground could look at their daily values without scrolling through thousands of spreadsheet rows or waiting on an analysis from operators. They could also look at averages, totals, highs, and lows. After this, Sancho brings in AI Agent. Sancho’s AI Agent delivers real-time insights. So when suspicious activity in a remote area is detected a notification appears and teams on the ground can deploy to halt deforestation in its tracks.
This conceptual use case is used to create awareness of deforestation and the amazing solutions that innovators are coming up with. To learn more about remote sensing check out this NASA article: https://earthdata.nasa.gov/learn/backgrounders/remote-sensing