Research Database
Displaying 81 - 100 of 194
Identifying building locations in the wildland–urban interface before and after fires with convolutional neural networks
Year: 2023
Background: Wildland–urban interface (WUI) maps identify areas with wildfire risk, but they are often outdated owing to the lack of building data. Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) can extract building locations from remote sensing data, but their accuracy in WUI areas is unknown. Additionally, CNNs are computationally intensive and technically complex, making them challenging for end-users, such as those who use or create WUI maps, to apply. Aims: We identified buildings pre- and post-wildfire and estimated building destruction for three California wildfires: Camp, Tubbs and Woolsey.…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Flammability study of decking sections found at the Wildland–Urban interface at different scales
Year: 2023
This work presents a study of the fire reaction of two types of decking sections (wood and thermoplastic) exposed to a radiant heat source. The flammability was studied at two scales: a cone calorimeter was used at product scale (36 cm2) and at assembly scale (around 1300 cm2), experiments were performed under a Large Scale Heat Release calorimeter with a radiant burner. Since the wood decking sections have gaps, the influence of the orientation of the sections facing the burner was further investigated. At product scale, the wood sections ignite sooner than the thermoplastic sections whereas…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Wildfire risk, salience, and housing development in the wildland–urban interface
Year: 2023
As wildfires increase in both severity and frequency, understanding the role of risk saliency on human behaviors in the face of fire risks becomes paramount. While research has shown that homebuyers capitalize wildfire risk following a fire, studies of the role that risk saliency plays on residential development is limited. This paper aims to fill this gap by studying the link between wildfire risk saliency and the rate of residential development in wildfire-prone areas, by treating recent wildfires as conditionally exogenous shocks to saliency. Using geospatial data on residential…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Community Engagement With Proactive Wildfire Management in British Columbia, Canada: Perceptions, Preferences, and Barriers to Action
Year: 2022
Wildfires in the wildland-urban interface (WUI) are increasingly threatening lives and livelihoods. These growing impacts have prompted a paradigm shift toward proactive wildfire management that prioritizes prevention and preparedness instead of response. Despite this shift, many communities remain unprepared for wildfires in the WUI due to diverse individual and social-political factors influencing engagement with proactive management approaches. The catastrophic fire seasons of 2017, 2018, and 2021 in British Columbia (BC), Canada, highlighted just how vulnerable communities continue to be…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Post-fire landscape evaluations in Eastern Washington, USA: Assessing the work of contemporary wildfires
Year: 2022
In the western US, wildfires are modifying the structure, composition, and patterns of forested landscapes at ratesthat far exceed mechanical thinning and prescribed fire treatments. There are conflicting narratives as to whetherthese wildfires are restoring landscape resilience to future climate and wildfires. To evaluate the landscape-levelwork of wildfires, we assessed four subwatersheds in eastern Washington, USA that experienced large wildfires in2014, 2015, or 2017 after more than a century of fire exclusion and extensive timber harvest. We compared preandpost-fire landscape conditions…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Relationships between building features and wildfire damage in California, USA and Pedrógão Grande, Portugal
Year: 2022
Background: Buildings in communities near wildlands, in the wildland–urban interface (WUI), can experience wildfire damage.Aims: To quantitatively assess the relationship between building features and damage, a building wildfire resistance index is developed and validated with the 2013–2017 CAL FIRE (DINS) database from California, USA, and the 2017 Pedrógão Grande Fire Complex post-fire investigation from Portugal.Methods: Three statistical dependence tests are compared to evaluate the relationship between selected building features and…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Growth of the wildland-urban interface within and around U.S. National Forests and Grasslands, 1990–2010
Year: 2022
The wildland-urban interface (WUI), where housing is in close proximity to or intermingled with wildland vegetation, is widespread throughout the United States, but it is unclear how this type of housing development affects public lands. We used a national dataset to examine WUI distribution and growth (1990–2010) in proximity to National Forests and created a typology to characterize each National Forest’s combination of WUI area and housing growth. We found that National Forests are hotspots for WUI growth, with a 38% increase in WUI area and 46% growth in WUI houses from 1990 to 2010, in…
Publication Type: Journal Article
A burning issue: Reviewing the sociodemographic and environmental justice aspects of the wildfire literature
Year: 2022
Larger and more severe wildfires are becoming more frequent and impacting different communities and human settlements. Much of the scientific literature and media on wildfires has focused on area of ecosystems burned and numbers of structures destroyed. Equally unprecedented, but often less reported, are the increasing socioeconomic impacts different people and communities face from wildfires. Such information seems to indicate an emerging need to account for wildfire effects on peri-urban or wildland urban interface (WUI) areas, newer socio-demographic groups, and disadvantaged communities.…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Comparing particulate morphology generated from human-made cellulosic fuels to natural vegetative fuels
Year: 2022
Background: In wildland–urban interface (WUI) fires, particulates from the combustion of both natural vegetative fuels and engineered cellulosic fuels may have deleterious effects on the environment. Aims: The research was conducted to investigate the morphology of the particulate samples generated from the combustion of oriented strand board (OSB). Findings were compared to the particulate samples collected from the combustion of noble-fir branches. Methods: The exposure conditions were varied to induce either smouldering combustion or flaming combustion of the specimens. Particulate samples…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Using Structure Location Data to Map the Wildland–Urban Interface in Montana, USA
Year: 2022
The increasing wildfire activity and rapid population growth in the wildland–urban interface (WUI) have made more Americans exposed to wildfire risk. WUI mapping plays a significant role in wildfire management. This study used the Microsoft building footprint (MBF) and the Montana address/structure framework datasets to map the WUI in Montana. A systematic comparison of the following three types of WUI was performed: the WUI maps derived from the Montana address/structure framework dataset (WUI-P), the WUI maps derived from the MBF dataset (WUI-S), and the Radeloff WUI map derived from census…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Reimagine fire science for the anthropocene
Year: 2022
Fire is an integral component of ecosystems globally and a tool that humans have harnessed for millennia. Altered fire regimes are a fundamental cause and consequence of global change, impacting people and the biophysical systems on which they depend. As part of the newly emerging Anthropocene, marked by human-caused climate change and radical changes to ecosystems, fire danger is increasing, and fires are having increasingly devastating impacts on human health, infrastructure, and ecosystem services. Increasing fire danger is a vexing problem that requires deep transdisciplinary, trans-…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Expanding wildland-urban interface alters forest structure and landscape context in the northern United States
Year: 2022
The wildland-urban interface (WUI), where housing intermingles with wildland vegetation, is the fastest-growing land use type in the United States. Given the ecological and social benefits of forest ecosystems, there is a growing need to more fully understand how such development alters the landscape context and structure of these WUI forests. In a space-for-time analysis we utilized land cover data, forest inventory plots, and housing density data over time to examine differences in forest characteristics of the northern US across three WUI change classes: (a) forest that has been in WUI…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Professional wildfire mitigation competency: a potential policy gap
Year: 2022
Studies show that effective strategies to mitigate the risk of structural damage in wildfires include defensible spaces and home hardening. Structures in the western United States are especially at risk. Several jurisdictions have adopted codes that require implementation of these strategies. However, construction and landscaping professionals are generally not required to obtain credentials indicating their competency in mitigating the risk of structural damage in a wildfire. We discuss the implications of this policy gap and propose a solution to bolster competency of professionals in…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Wildfire controls on land surface properties in mixed conifer and ponderosa pine forests of Sierra Nevada and Klamath mountains, Western US
Year: 2022
This study examines the post-fire biogeophysical and biochemical dynamics after several high-severity wildfires that occurred in mixed conifer and ponderosa pine forest types in the Sierra Nevada and Klamath Mountains regions between 1986 and 2017. We found a consistent pattern of reduced leaf area index (LAI) in the first year after fire, followed by gradual recovery over the subsequent 25 years. Recovery rate varied between forest types. For example, average summer LAI for 16-25 years post-fire was 88% of the pre-fire average for mixed conifers in the Sierra Nevada, 64% for ponderosa pine…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Exploring the social legacy of frequent wildfires: Organizational responses for community recovery following the 2018 Camp Fire
Year: 2022
The increased global frequency and scale of impactful and destructive wildfires has necessitated the reimagination of recovery assistance in affected communities. Unequal experience with and access to resources to support recovery mean that organizations operating at different scales may provide varying types of assistance after fire, particularly in rural areas. The US state of California has experienced several notable wildfire events in the past decade, including the 2018 Camp Fire that broke state and national records associated with the losses it caused. Interviews with 45 individuals…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Comparing particulate morphology generated from human- made cellulosic fuels to natural vegetative fuels
Year: 2022
Background: In wildland–urban interface (WUI) fires, particulates from the combustion of both natural vegetative fuels and engineered cellulosic fuels may have deleterious effects on the environment. Aims: The research was conducted to investigate the morphology of the particulate samples generated from the combustion of oriented strand board (OSB). Findings were compared to the particulate samples collected from the combustion of noble-fir branches. Methods: The exposure conditions were varied to induce either smouldering combustion or flaming combustion of the specimens. Particulate samples…
Publication Type: Journal Article
The right to burn: barriers and opportunities for Indigenous-led fire stewardship in Canada
Year: 2022
Indigenous fire stewardship enhances ecosystem diversity, assists with the management of complex resources, and reduces wildfire risk by lessening fuel loads. Although Indigenous Peoples have maintained fire stewardship practices for millennia and continue to be keepers of fire knowledge, significant barriers exist for re-engaging in cultural burning. Indigenous communities in Canada have unique vulnerabilities to large and high-intensity wildfires as they are predominately located in remote, forested regions and lack financial support at federal and provincial levels to mitigate wildfire…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Roles and experiences of non-governmental organisations in wildfire response and recovery
Year: 2021
Local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) play critical roles in providing immediate relief resources and long-term recovery support for communities after a disaster. Drawing on interviews with NGO representatives involved in three Northern California wildfires in 2017 and 2018, this study identifies challenges and opportunities for NGOs supporting wildfire relief and recovery. Across fires andNGOs,NGOmanagement and wellbeing, coordination and disaster experiences emerge as common barriers and enablers of relief and recovery. In many cases, local NGOs’ participation in wildfire relief and…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Planning for future fire: Scenario analysis of an accelerated fuel reduction plan for the western United States
Year: 2021
Recent fire seasons brought a new fire reality to the western US, and motivated federal agencies to explore scenarios for augmenting current fuel management and forest restoration in areas where fires might threatencritical resources and developed areas. To support this effort, we modeled the scheduling of an accelerated forest and fuel management scenario on 76 western US national forests. Specifically, we modeled a 10-year ramp up of current forest and fuel management that targeted the source of wildfire exposure to developed areas andsimulated treatment in areas that accounted for 77% of…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Episodic occurrence of favourable weather constrains recovery of a cold desert shrubland after fire
Year: 2021
1. Key to the long-term resilience of dryland ecosystems is the recovery of foundation plant species following disturbance. In ecosystems with high interannual weather variability, understanding the influence of short-term environmental conditions on establishment of foundation species is essential for identifying vulnerable landscapes and developing restoration strategies. We asked how annual environmental conditions affect post-fire establishment of Artemisia tridentata, a shrub species that dominates landscapes across much of the western United States, and evaluated the influence of…
Publication Type: Journal Article