Difference between revisions of "TEAMS"

Revision as of 18:03, 15 September 2009

General System description

System name: Terrestrial Ecosystem Analysis and Modelling System

Acronym: TEAMS

Brief overview

TEAMS is a tactical planning system designed to aid forest managers in developing site-specific management schedules that will conform to standards and guidelines specified by forest plans and will achieve stated goals.

Scope of the system

TEAMS is a stand analysis level tool who provides alternatives such as various harvesting and thinning options. TEAMS may be used in three ways:

• Managers may directly specify how each stand within the management area should be treated. The system will then project and display on a computer screen the results of the prescribed treatment schedule that managers can subsequently compare to goals, standards, and guidelines. Alternatively,
• managers may specify goals, standards, and guidelines for the unit, and TEAMS will produce an optimal treatment schedule and project results. Or,
• a combination of the first two options may be employed with prescriptions for some stands specified by the managers and others determined by the system.

It is operational only for USA's southwestern ponderosa pine (Pinus brachyptera Engelm.). Also, transportation and road systems have not been incorporated.

System origin

• It was developed in the late 80's by a team from the Northern Arizona University led by the professor W.W. Covington.
• how was it developed
• is it a commercial product
• does it have real-life application cases

Support for specific issues

It tried to be at his moment a bridge for planners and foresters in the gap then existing between strategic planning and implementation.

Support for specific thematic areas of a problem type

• Silvicultural
• Certification
• Conservation
• Restoration
• Transportation
• Development choices / land use zoning
• Policy/intervention alternatives
• Sustainability impact assessment (SIA)

Data and data models

Typical spatial extent of application

The primary unit of analysis is the stand, but the model also processes alternatives at the management unit level (as opposed to the stand level), including recreational developments and range improvement options.

Forest data input

A stand inventory data has to be entered into R:Base 5000, and the stand boundaries and other pertinent map features have to be digitized using ARC/INFO.

Type of information input from user (via GUI)

TEAMS users can enter information on recreational development alternatives and range improvement options. Also, they have to elect an objective function (e.g., maximize present net value, maximize water yield, or minimize costs) and specify constraint levels for any of the constraint options provided (e.g., maximum sawtimber harvest, minimum acreage of elk cover, or maximum budget).

Users can also specify goals for an array of outputs along with weights that reflect the importance of goal deviations. The objective function minimizes the sum of deviations from the specified goals.

Models

Forest models

Yield, economics are implemented.

Decision Support

Definition of management interventions

Depending on the type of simulation chosen.

Typical temporal scale of application

Tactical planning.

Types of decisions supported

• Management level
  • administrative decisions
  • operating control decisions
• Management function
• planning decisions
  • organizing decisions
  • command decisions
  • control decisions
  • coordination decisions
• decision making situation
  • unilateral
  • collegial
  • Bargaining / participative decision making

Decision-making processes and models

• Logic modeling
• Operations research modeling
  • Direct approaches
  • Heuristic manipulation of simulation models
• Business modeling
• Simulation (with and without stochasticity)
• Multiple criteria/ranking
• Other

Output

Types of outputs

TEAMS projects outcomes of treatment alternatives, and displays results in graphic, tabular, and map forms. This outputs are yields, costs, and net benefits, associated with implementation of the optimal solution (or user-specified prescriptions). It also forecasts future stand structures as they develop over time.

Spatial analysis capabilities

Some spatial analysis and constraints are accounted. For example no regeneration harvest are allowed in adjacent stands within any 30-year period.

Abilities to address interdisciplinary, multi-scaled, and political issues

Evaluate interactions between different basic information types (biophysical, economic, social). Produce coordinated results for decision makers operating at different spatial scales facilitate social negotiation and learning.

System

Architecture and major DSS components

TEAMS is an integrated set of programs consisting of:

• R:Base 5000, a relational database management system,
• CLOUT, a database query system that is a companion to R:Base,
• ARC/INFO, a geographic information system,
• ECOSIM, a multiresource forest management simulation system that was expanded to include economic algorithms for timber and range as well as additional wildlife algorithms,
• RANREC, a program that calculates the economic consequences of recreation and range development and other user-specified costs and benefits,
• LINDO, a linear programming package,
• USER, a subroutine that generates the matrix for LINDO,
• Microsoft CHART, a graphics package,
• GRAPHS, a program that calculates the consequences of implementing the linear programming solution for input to CHART,
• COMPARE, a program that translates multiresource outputs and economic data from two to four LINDO solutions at a time so that these data can be compared graphically using CHART and geographically using ARC/INFO, and
• TABLES, a program that generates summary tables to complement the CHART output.

From these programms, R:Base 5000, CLOUT, ARC/INFO, LINDO, and CHART were commercially available software packages. ECOSIM was developed by the Forest Service and maintained by the School of Forestry from the Northern Arizona University. Others were packages specigically created for this occasion.

Usage

It has been used in teaching at the Northern Arizona University, and informally in some national forest plans.

Computational limitations

It had at the time some time limitations. For example, although integer programming is inefficient, tests had shown that a 300-stand management unit required about 8 hours to process.

References

External resources

COVINGTON W.W., D.B. WOOD, D.L. YOUNG, D.R DYKSTRA, and L.D. GARRETT (1988): TEAMS: A Decision Support System for Multiresource Management. Journal of Forestry, Vol.86, No. 8.