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Can we manage a future with more fire? Effectiveness of defensible space treatment depends on housing amount and configuration

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Abstract

Context

Fire in forested wildland urban interface (WUI) landscapes is increasing throughout the western United States. Spatial patterns of fuels treatments affect fire behavior, but it is unclear how fire risk and fuel treatment effectiveness will change under future conditions.

Objectives

(1) How do area burned, forest and fuel characteristics, and fire risk change over time under twenty-first-century climate? (2) When defensible space fuels treatments are applied around all houses, which scenarios of WUI housing amount and configuration minimize fire risk?

Methods

In generic 10,000-ha US Northern Rocky Mountain subalpine forest landscapes, we simulated 21 scenarios differing in fuels treatment, housing amount and configuration (neutral landscape models), and projected future climate using the process-based model iLand. We compared fire risk at three scales: 1-ha home ignition zone (HIZ), 9-ha safe suppression zone (SSZ), and landscape.

Results

Under warm-dry climate, annual area burned increased, but area burned at high fire intensity peaked in the 2060s and then declined sharply; fire risk followed similar trends. Defensible space treatments maintained low flame lengths in HIZs. Clustered housing was more effective at reducing SSZ risk compared to dispersed housing. At landscape scales, treating more of the landscape reduced fire risk but configuration was unimportant.

Conclusions

The most effective strategy for reducing fire risk depends on the scale at which risk is assessed. Clustering WUI developments and treating between 10 and 30% of the landscape every 10 years can reduce fire risk across multiple scales.

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Data availability

Data, code, and software used for model simulations and analyses in this manuscript are publicly available in the Environmental Data Initiative repository, https://doi.org/10.6073/pasta/696e59acecd0bd289dae1afe3316c09c.

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Acknowledgements

KHB, RS, WR, and MGT designed the study; RS and WR provided model code and ongoing development; KHB adapted fire intensity calculations and performed model evaluation, simulations, and data analysis; KHB and MGT wrote the manuscript, and all authors contributed. We are especially grateful for feedback and suggestions from forest and fire managers and researchers who participated in two series of workshops in 2017 and 2020 facilitated by the Northern Rockies Fire Science Network and funded by the Joint Fire Science Program. Thank you to Anne Black, Vita Wright, and Signe Leirfallom for coordinating and facilitating these workshops. We thank Dan Donato, Chris Kucharik, Winslow Hansen, Tyler Hoecker, Anthony Ives, Volker Radeloff, Zak Ratajczak, Adena Rissman, and two anonymous reviewers for providing constructive comments that greatly improved our study design and manuscript. Drs. Hansen and Ratajczak also provided much appreciated technical assistance. Thank you to Liba Pejchar and Sarah Reed for providing data on conservation development subdivisions. We acknowledge funding from the Joint Fire Science Program (16-3-01-4) and the University of Wisconsin Vilas Trust.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Integrative Biology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Kristin H. Braziunas & Monica G. Turner

  2. Ecosystem Dynamics and Forest Management Group, Technical University of Munich, 85354, Freising, Germany

    Rupert Seidl & Werner Rammer

  3. Berchtesgaden National Park, 83471, Berchtesgaden, Germany

    Rupert Seidl

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  1. Kristin H. Braziunas
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  2. Rupert Seidl
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  3. Werner Rammer
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  4. Monica G. Turner
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Correspondence to Kristin H. Braziunas.

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Braziunas, K.H., Seidl, R., Rammer, W. et al. Can we manage a future with more fire? Effectiveness of defensible space treatment depends on housing amount and configuration. Landscape Ecol 36, 309–330 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-020-01162-x

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