Restoration and Hazardous Fuel Reduction

Displaying 31 - 40 of 156

Harnessing Natural Disturbances: A Nature-Based Solution for Restoring and Adapting Dry Forests in the Western USA to Climate Change

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Natural disturbances (wildfires, droughts, beetle outbreaks) shaped temperate forests for millennia, including dry forests of the western USA. Could they now best restore and adapt dry forests to climate change while protecting nearby communities?

Avoided wildfire impact modeling with counterfactual probabilistic analysis

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

Assessing the effectiveness and measuring the performance of fuel treatments and other wildfire risk mitigation efforts are challenging endeavors. Perhaps the most complicated is quantifying avoided impacts. In this study, we show how probabilistic counterfactual analysis can help with performance evaluation.

Consistently heterogeneous structures observed at multiple spatial scales across fire-intact reference sites

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

Yellow pine and mixed-conifer (YPMC) forests of California’s Sierra Nevada have experienced widespread fire suppression for over a century, resulting in ingrowth and densification of trees, heavy fuel accumulation, and shifts in species composition.

Low-intensity fires mitigate the risk of high-intensity wildfires in California’s forests

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

The increasing frequency of severe wildfires demands a shift in landscape management to mitigate their consequences. The role of managed, low-intensity fire as a driver of beneficial fuel treatment in fire-adapted ecosystems has drawn interest in both scientific and policy venues.

Community Forests advance local wildfire governance and proactive management in British Columbia, Canada

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

As wildfires are increasingly causing negative impacts to communities and their livelihoods, many communities are demanding more proactive and locally driven approaches to address wildfire risk. This marks a shift away from centralized governance models where decision-making is concentrated in government agencies that prioritize reactive wildfire suppression.

Evidence for multi-decadal fuel buildup in a large California wildfire from smoke radiocarbon measurements

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

In recent decades, there has been a significant increase in annual area burned in California's Sierra Nevada mountains. This rise in fire activity has prompted the need to understand how historical forest management practices affect fuel composition and emissions.

Indigenous Fire Futures

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

Dominant causal explanations of the wildfire threat in California include anthropogenic climate change, fire suppression, industrial logging, and the expansion of residential settlements, which are all products of settler colonial property regimes and structures of resource extraction.

Climate change is narrowing and shifting prescribed fire windows in western United States

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

Escalating wildfire activity in the western United States has accelerated adverse societal impacts. Observed increases in wildfire severity and impacts to communities have diverse anthropogenic causes—including the legacy of fire suppression policies, increased development in high-risk zones, and aridification by a warming climate.

Does large area burned mean a bad fire year? Comparing contemporary wildfire years to historical fire regimes informs the restoration task in fire-dependent forests

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

Wildfires and fire seasons are commonly rated largely on the simple metric of area burned (more hectares: bad). A seemingly paradoxical narrative frames large fire seasons as a symptom of a forest health problem (too much fire), while simultaneously stating that fire-dependent forests lack sufficient fire to maintain system resilience (too little fire).

Variable Support and Opposition to Fuels Treatments for Wildfire Risk Reduction: Melding Frameworks for Local Context and Collaborative Potential

Year of Publication

2023

Publication Type

Journal Article

Fuels reduction projects are an increasing focus of policy, funding, and management actions aimed at reducing wildfire risk to human populations while improving landscape health. This research used in-depth interviews to explore variable support or opposition to three fuels-reduction projects occurring in the same region of north central Washington State, USA.

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