Research Database
Displaying 61 - 80 of 127
Policy Scenarios for fire-adapted communities: Understanding stakeholder risk-perceptions, using Fuzzy Cognitive Maps
Year: 2017
Collaborative groups are most effective when the varied stakeholder groups within them understand the risks of wildfire and take proactive steps to manage these risks. Implementing policies for fire risk mitigation and adaptation, however, remains difficult because risks and policy alternatives are not understood or supported uniformly across diverse stakeholders. To facilitate greater understanding and collaboration across diverse groups, we developed a novel approach, based on Fuzzy Cognitive Maps (FCM), in which we systematically collected mental model representations from a range of…
Publication Type: Report
A Review of Pathways for Building Fire Spread in the Wildland Urban Interface Part II: Response of Components and Systems and Mitigation Strategies in the United States
Year: 2017
Structure loss in wildland fires has significantly increased over the past few decades, affected by increased development in rural areas, changing fuel management policies, and climate change, all of which are projected to increase in the future. This paper is Part II of a two-part review, which presents a summary of fundamental and applied research on pathways to fire spread in the wildland urban interface. Part I discussed the fundamentals of wildland fire spread via radiative heat transfer, direct flame contact, and firebrand exposure. Here in Part II, we cover the response of building…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Fire Science Exchange Network
Year: 2017
The Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP) Fire Science Exchange Network is a national collaboration of 15 regional fire science exchanges that provides the most relevant, current wildland fire science information to federal, state, local, tribal, and private stakeholders within ecologically similar regions. The network brings fire managers, practitioners, and scientists together to address regional fire management needs and challenges.
Publication Type: Report
Joint Fire Science Program Smoke Science Plan Conclusion: Smoke Science Accomplishments Under the Plan
Year: 2017
The Smoke Science Plan (SSP) was the guidance and organizational tool of the Joint Fire Science Program for smoke research from 2011 until 2016. It helped to guide the funding and management of 41 research and development projects under four thematic areas. Since its inception in 2011, 29 smoke science projects have been funded. An additional 12 legacy projects, addressing research needs identified in the SSP, were added to the portfolio for a total of 41 projects considered as part of the SSP.
Publication Type: Report
Bridging the gap: Joint Fire Science Program Outcomes
Year: 2017
The Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP) has funded an impressive number of research projects over the years. However, the number of projects does not necessarily provide an accurate picture of the program’s effectiveness. Over the last decade, researchers have collected data and conducted several studies to determine whether the results of JFSP-funded projects are reaching potential users and informing management decisions and actions. Those studies have helped identify issues and influence changes within the program. Early studies pointed out the need for a boundary-spanning organization to…
Publication Type: Report
Polishing the Prism: Improving Wildfire Mitigation Planning by Coupling Landscape and Social Dimensions
Year: 2016
Effectively addressing wildfire risk to communities on large multi-owner landscapes requires an understanding of the biophysical factors that influence risk, such as fuel loads, topography, and weather, and social factors such as the capacity and willingness for communities to engage in fire-mitigation activities. Biophysical and social processes often are disconnected in wildfire mitigation planning frameworks because of mismatches in scale. The different spatial and temporal scales of these processes usually are not recognized in the planning process. Forest Service scientists Alan Ager,…
Publication Type: Report
Wildfire risk associated with different vegetation types within and outside wildland-urban interfaces
Year: 2016
Wildland-urban interfaces (WUIs) are areas where urban settlements and wildland vegetation intermingle, making the interaction between human activities and wildlife especially intense. Their relevance is increasing worldwide as they are expanding and are associated with fire risk. The WUI may affect the fire risk associated with the type of vegetation (land cover/land use; LULC), a well-known risk factor, due to differences in the type and intensity of human activities in different LULCs within and outside WUIs. No previous studies analyse this interaction between the effects of the WUI and…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Examining alternative fuel management strategies and the relative contribution of National Forest System land to wildfire risk to adjacent homes – A pilot assessment on the Sierra National Forest, California, USA
Year: 2016
Determining the degree of risk that wildfires pose to homes, where across the landscape the risk originates, and who can best mitigate risk are integral elements of effective co-management of wildfire risk. Developing assessments and tools to help provide this information is a high priority for federal land management agencies such as the US Forest Service (USFS) that have limited resources to invest in hazardous fuel reduction and other mitigation activities. In this manuscript we investigate the degree to which fuel management practices on USFS land can reduce wildfire exposure to human…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Scanning the Future of Wildfire: Resilience Ahead...Whether We Like It or Not?
Year: 2016
The field of so-called “futures research” provides researchers and stakeholders in a given subject area or system a way to map out and plan for alternate possible scenarios of the future. A recent research project supported by the Joint Fire Science Program brought together futures researchers and wildfire specialists to envision what the future holds for wildfire impacts and how the wildfire community may respond to the complex suite of emerging challenges. The consensus of the project’s foresight panel suggests that an era of resilience is ahead: but that this resilience may come either…
Publication Type: Report
Recovery and adaptation after wildfire on the Colorado Front Range (2010-2012)
Year: 2016
Following the loss of homes to wildfire, when risk has been made apparent, homeowners must decide whether to rebuild, and choose materials and vegetation, while local governments guide recovery and rebuilding. As wildfires are smaller and more localised than other disasters, it is unclear if recovery after wildfire results in policy change and adaptation, decreasing assets at risk, or if recovery encourages reinvestment in hazard-prone areas. We studied three wildfires on the Colorado Front Range from2010 to 2012 that each destroyed over 150homes, describing policy response and characterising…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Drivers of Wildfire Suppression Costs: A Review
Year: 2016
As federal spending on wildland fire suppression has increased dramatically in recent decades, significant policymaking has been designed, at least in part, to address and temper rising costs. Effective strategies for controlling public spending and leveraging limited wildfire management resources depend on a comprehensive understanding of the drivers of suppression costs. Problematically, frequently noted drivers often do not explain variability between similar wildfires or comparable wildfire seasons. As speculation and scrutiny around rising costs have increased, so too have scholarly…
Publication Type: Report
Secretarial Order 3336 Science Priorities: The Role of Science Past, Present, and Future
Year: 2016
Within sagebrush (Artemisia spp.) ecosystems, which are home to more than 350 species of plants and animals, potentially more frequent and severe fires are causing an increased threat to human safety, property, rural economies, and wildlife habitat. In particular, the habitat of the greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus), an iconic sagebrush-dependent species, is at risk. In response to this reality, on January 15, 2015, Secretary Sally Jewell signed Secretarial Order 3336 (S.O. 3336), titled “Rangeland Fire Prevention, Management, and Restoration.” The main purpose of the order is…
Publication Type: Report
Assessing the impacts of federal forest planning on wildfire risk-mitigation in the Pacific Northwest, USA
Year: 2016
We analyzed the impact of amenity and biodiversity protection as mandated in national forest plans on the implementation of hazardous fuel reduction treatments aimed at protecting the wildland urban interface (WUI) and restoring fire resilient forests. We used simulation modeling to delineate areas on national forests that can potentially transmit fires to adjacent WUI. We then intersected these areas with national forest planning maps to determine where mechanical treatments are allowed for restoration and fire protection, versus areas where they are prohibited. We found that a large…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Places where wildfire potential and social vulnerability coincide in the coterminous United States
Year: 2016
The hazards-of-place model posits that vulnerability to environmental hazards depends on both biophysical and social factors. Biophysical factors determine where wildfire potential is elevated, whereas social factors determine where and how people are affected by wildfire. We evaluated place vulnerability to wildfire hazards in the coterminous US. We developed a social vulnerability index using principal component analysis and evaluated it against existing measures of wildfire potential and wildland–urban interface designations. We created maps showing the coincidence of social vulnerability…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Categorizing the social context of the wildland urban interface: Adaptive capacity for wildfire and community "archetypes"
Year: 2015
Understanding the local context that shapes collective response to wildfire risk continues to be a challenge for scientists and policymakers. This study utilizes and expands on a conceptual approach for understanding adaptive capacity to wildfire in a comparison of 18 past case studies. The intent is to determine whether comparison of local social context and community characteristics across cases can identify community "archetypes" that approach wildfire planning and mitigation in consistently different ways. Identification of community archetypes serves as a potential strategy for…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Fire, Fuels, and Streams: The Effects and Effectiveness of Riparian Treatments
Year: 2015
Fire is an important disturbance in riparian systems—consuming vegetation; increasing light;creating snags and debris flows; altering habitat structure; and affecting stream conditions, erosion, andhydrology. For many years, land managers have worked to keep fire out of riparian systems through theuse of buffers. A number of projects funded by the Joint Fire Science Program are shedding light onthe dynamics of fire in riparian systems. Recent research and field practice have shown that (1) ripariantreatments can be beneficial and are not as risky as previously thought; and (2) riparian…
Publication Type: Report
Re-envisioning community-wildfire relations in the U.S. West as adaptive governance
Year: 2015
Prompted by a series of increasingly destructive, expensive, and highly visible wildfire crises in human communities across the globe, a robust body of scholarship has emerged to theorize, conceptualize, and measure community-level resilience to wildfires. To date, however, insufficient consideration has been given to wildfire resilience as a process of adaptive governance mediated by institutions at multiple scales. Here we explore the possibilities for addressing this gap through an analysis of wildfire resilience among wildland-urban interface communities in the western region of the…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Understanding gaps between the risk perceptions of wildland-urban interface (WUI) residents and wildfire professionals
Year: 2015
Research across a variety of risk domains finds that the risk perceptions of professionals and the public differ. Such risk perception gaps occur if professionals and the public understand individual risk factors differently or if they aggregate risk factors into overall risk differently. The nature of such divergences, whether based on objective inaccuracies or on differing perspectives, is important to understand. However, evidence of risk perception gaps typically pertains to general, overall risk levels; evidence of and details about mismatches between the specific level of risk faced by…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Evaluating the Effectiveness of Wildfire Mitigation Activities in the Wildland-Urban Interface
Year: 2015
We assessed wildfire mitigation activities in the wildland-urban interface (WUI) of New Mexico to identifywhich strategies are most effective. First, we modeledhow fuel treatments change wildfire behavior in 12 WUI areas.The second element of our analysis used data from over 2,000assessments of home wildfire hazard to better understand howthose hazards are distributed and change over time. We examinedthe Firewise communities in New Mexico because of the importantrole the Firewise program plays in public wildfire educationnationally. The fourth element of our assessment examined nineCommunity…
Publication Type: Report
Negative consequences of positive feedbacks in US wildfire management
Year: 2015
Over the last two decades wildfire activity, damage, and management cost within the US have increased substantially. These increases have been associated with a number of factors including climate change and fuel accumulation due to a century of active fire suppression. The increased fire activity has occurred during a time of significant ex-urban development of the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) along with increased demand on water resources originating on forested landscapes. These increased demands have put substantial pressure on federal agencies charged with wildfire management to…
Publication Type: Journal Article