Smoke from wildfires has become a growing public health issue around the world but especially in western North America and California. At the same time, managers and scientists recommend thinning and intentional use of wildland fires to restore forest health and reduce smoke from poorly controlled wildfires.
Mechanical forest thinning treatments are implemented across the western United States (US) to improve forest health and reduce hazardous fuels. However, the main challenge in thinning operations is low financial feasibility.
The recovery requires an “all-hands-on-deck” approach to meet people where they are, assesstheir needs, and work collaboratively for the best solutions in each community. In addition, it willbe critical to listen to individuals in communities to gain a deep understanding of barriers andneeds.
Catastrophic forest disturbances, such as wildfires, insect outbreaks, and hurricanes, have become more frequent in recent decades. Such disturbances can create supply disruptions in regional timber markets, with potentially significant short-run and long-run price effects. We review the time-series intervention models that have been used to analyze the impacts of forest disturbances.
There has been an increasing interest in the economic health cost from smoke exposure from wildfires in thepast 20 years, particularly in the north-western USA that is reflected in an emergent literature. In this review, we provide anoverview and discussion of studies since 2006 on the health impacts of wildfire smoke and of approaches for the estimationof the associated economic cost.
Modelling the spatial prioritisation of fuel treatments and their net effect on values at risk is an important area for applied work as economic damages from wildfire continue to grow. We model and demonstrate a cost-effective fuel treatment planning algorithm using two ecosystem services as benefits for which fuel treatments are prioritised.
This report summarizes the accumulated impacts and associated costs of wildfires at the local, state, and federal level.
Wildfire’s economic, ecological and social impacts are on the rise, fostering the realisation that business-as-usual fire management in the United States is not sustainable.
Wildland firefighting in the United States is a complex and costly enterprise. While there are strong seasonal signatures for fire occurrence in specific regions of the United States, spatiotemporal occurrence of wildfire activity can have high inter-annual variability.
Characterising the impacts of wildland fire and fire suppression is critical information for fire management decision-making.