Measuring the effect of fuel treatments on forest carbon using landscape risk analysis

Natural Hazards and Earth System Science

Volumn 10, Issue 12, 2010, Pages 2515-2526

  Ager, A A ^a   Finney, M A ^b   Mcmahan, A ^c   Cathcart, J ^d  

^a PACIFIC NORTHWEST RESEARCH STATION   (United States)

^b ROCKY MOUNTAIN RESEARCH STATION   (United States)

^c USDA FOREST SERVICE   (United States)

^d OREGON DEPARTMENT OF FORESTRY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CARBON EMISSION; CARBON SEQUESTRATION; FOREST DYNAMICS; MODELING; PROBABILITY; RISK ASSESSMENT; WATERSHED; WILDFIRE;

OREGON; UNITED STATES; WINEMA NATIONAL FOREST;

EID: 78650027237     PISSN: 15618633     EISSN: 16849981     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.5194/nhess-10-2515-2010     Document Type: Article

References (63)

1. Agee, J. K. and Skinner, C. N.: Basic principles of fires fuel reduction treatments, Forest Ecol. Manag., 211, 83-96, 2005.
2. Agee, J. K., Bahro, B. B., Finney, M. A., Omi, P. N., Sapsis, D. B., Skinner, C. N., van Wagtendonk, J. W., and Weatherspoon, C. P.: The use of shaded fuelbreaks in landscape fire management, Forest Ecol. Manag., 127, 55-66, 2000.
3. Ager, A. A. and Finney, M. A.: Application of wildfire simulation models for risk analysis, Geophysical Research Abstracts, EGU General Assembly, Vol. 11, EGU2009-5489, 2009.
4. Ager, A. A., Finney, M. A., and Bahro, B.: Automating fireshed assessments and analyzing wildfire risk with ArcFuels, Forest Ecol. Manag., 234 S, p. 215, 2006.
5. Ager, A. A., Finney, M. A., Kerns, B. K., and Maffei, H.: Modeling wildfire risk to northern spotted owl (Strix occidentalis cuariana) habitat in Central Oregon, USA, Forest Ecol. Manag., 246, 45-56, 2007.
6. Ager, A. A., Vaillant, N., and Finney, M. A.: A comparison of landscape fuel treatment strategies to mitigate wildland fire risk in the urban interface and preserve old forest structure, Forest Ecol. Manag., 259, 1556-1570, 2010.
7. Anderson, D. H., Catchpole, E. A., DeMestre, N. J., and Parkes, T.: Modelling the spread of grass fires, J. Austral. Math. Soc. B., 23, 451-466, 1982.
8. Arca, B., Duce, P., Laconi, M., Pellizzaro, G., Salis, M., and Spano, D.: Evaluation of FARSITE simulator in Mediterranean maquis, Int. J. Wildland Fire, 16, 563-572, 2007.
9. Bachelet, D., Neilson, R. P., Lenihan, J. M., and Drapek, R. J.: Climate change effects on vegetation distribution and carbon budget in the United States, Ecoystems, 4, 164-185, 2001.
10. Bettinger, P., Graetz, D., Ager, A. A., and Sessions, J.: The SafeD forest landscape planning model, in: Methods for integrating modelling of landscape change: Interior Northwest Landscape Analysis System, technically edited by: Hayes, J. L., Ager, A. A., and Barbour, R. J., U. S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station, Portland, OR, Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-610, Chapter 4, 41-63, 2004.
11. Calkin, D. E., Ager, A. A., Gilbertson-Day, J., Patten, C., Scott, J., and Quigley, T.: A wildfire risk assessment for the continental United States, Rocky Mountain Research Station, General Technical Report, RMRS-GTR-235, 62 pp., 2010.
12. Carmel, Y., Shlomit P., Faris, J., and Shoshany, M.: Assessing fire risk using Monte Carlo simulations of fire spread, Forest Ecol. Manag., 257, 370-377, 2009.
13. Collins, B. M., Kelly, M., van Wagtendonk, J. W., and Stephens, S. L.: Spatial patterns of large natural fires in Sierra Nevada wilderness areas, Landscape Ecol., 22, 545-557, 2007.
14. Collins, B. M., Miller, J. D., Thode, A. E., Kelly, M., van Wagtendonk, J. W., and Stephens, S. L.: Interactions among wildland fires in a long-established Sierra Nevada natural fire area, Ecosystems, 12, 114-128, 2009.
15. Depro, B. M., Murray, B., Alig, R., and Shanks, A.: Public Land, Timber Harvests, and Climate Mitigation: Quantifying Carbon Sequestration Potential on U. S. Public Timberlands, Forest Ecol. Manag., 255, 1122-1134, 2008.
16. Dixon, G. E.: Essential FVS: A user's guide to the Forest Vegetation Simulator, USDA Forest Service, Fort Collins, CO, USA, Forest Management Service Center Internal Report, 193 pp., 2003.
17. Finkral, A. and Evans, A.: The effects of a thinning treatment on carbon stocks in a northern Arizona ponderosa pine forest, Forest Ecol. Manag., 255, 2743-2750, 2008.
18. Finney, M. A.: Modeling the spread and behavior of prescribed natural fires, Proc. 12th Conf. Fire and Forest Meteorology, Jekyll Island, GA, USA, 138-14, 1994.
19. Finney, M. A.: FARSITE: Fire Area simulator - model development and evaluation, USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Technical Report RP-4, 1998.
20. Finney, M. A.: Design of regular landscape fuel treatment patterns for modifying fire growth and behaviour, Forest Sci., 47, 219-228, 2001.
21. Finney, M. A.: Fire growth using minimum travel time methods, Can. J. Forest Res., 32, 1420-1424, 2002.
22. Finney, M. A.: The challenge of quantitative risk analysis for wildland fire, Forest Ecol. Manag., 211, 97-108, 2005.
23. Finney, M. A.: An overview of FlamMap fire modeling capabilities, in: Fuels Management-How to Measure Success: Conference Proceedings, 28-30 March 2006, Portland, OR, edited by: Andrews, P. L. Butler, B. W., USDA Forest Service, Fort Collins, CO, Rocky Mountain Research Station Proceedings RMRS-P-41, 213-220, 2006.
24. Finney, M. A. and Cohen, J. D.: Expectation and evaluation of fuel management objectives, in: Fire, Fuel Treatments, and Ecological Restoration: Conference Proceedings, 16-18 April 2002, Fort Collins, CO, USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station Proceedings RMRS-P-29, 353-366, 2003.
25. Finney, M. A., McHugh, C. W., and Grenfell, I. C.: Stand-and landscape-level effects of prescribed burning on two Arizona wildfires, Can. J. Forest Res., 35, 1714-1722, 2005.
26. ¡ Simulation of long-term landscape-level fuel treatment effects on large wildfires, Int. J. Wildland Fire, 16, 712-727, 2007.
27. Flowers, P. J., Hunter, T. P., and Mills, T. J.: Design of a model to simulate large-fire suppression effectiveness, in: Proceedings of the 7th Conference on Fire and Forest Meteorology, Boston, Massachusetts, American Meteorological Society, 168-173, 1983.
28. Gedalof, Z., Peterson, D. L., and Mantua, N. J.: Atmospheric, climatic, and ecological controls on extreme wildfire years in the northwestern United States, Ecol. Appl., 15, 154-174, 2005.
29. Healthy Forest Restoration Act: Healthy Forest Restoration Act [HFRA] of 2003, Public Law 108-148, Statutes at Large 117, 2003.
30. Hoover, C. and Rebain, S.: The Kane Experimental Forest carbon inventory: carbon reporting with FVS, Pp. 17-22, in: Third Forest Vegetation Simulator Conference, 13-15 February 2007, Fort Collins, CO, edited by: Havis, R. N. and Crookston, N. L., USDA forest Service, Fort Collins, CO, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Proceedings RMRS-P-54, 234 pp., 2008.
31. Hurteau, M. and North, M.: Fuel treatment effects on tree-based forest carbon storage and emissions under modelled wildfire scenarios, Front. Ecol. Environ., 7, 409-414, 2009.
32. Hurteau, M. D., Kock, G. W., and Hungate, B. A.: Carbon protection and fire risk reduction: toward a full accounting of forest carbon offsets, Front. Ecol. Environ., 6, 493-498, doi:10.1890/0701876, 2008.
33. Knight, I. and Coleman, J.: A fire perimeter expansion algorithm based on Huygens' wavelet propagation, Int. J. Wildland Fire, 3(2), 73-84, 1993.
34. Krasnow, K. T., Schoennagel, T. T., and Veblen, T.: Forest fuel mapping and validation of LANDFIRE fuel maps in Boulder County, Colorado, Forest Ecol. Manag., 257, 1603-1612, 2009.
35. LaCroix, J. J., Ryu, S. R., Zheng, D., and Chen, J.: Simulating Fire Spread with Landscape Management Scenarios, Forest Sci., 52, 522-529, 2006.
36. Massada, A. B., Redeloff, V., Stewart, S., and Hawbaker, T. J.: A simulation study in northwestern Wisconsin, Forest Ecol. Manag., 258, 1990-1999, 2009.
37. McKenzie, D., Gedalof, Z., Peterson, D. L., and Mote, P.: Climatic change, wildfire, and conservation, Conserv. Biol., 18, 890-902, 2004.
38. Miller, J. D. and Yool, S. R.: Modeling fire in semi-desert grassland/oak woodland: the spatial implications, Ecol. Model., 153, 229-245, 2002.
39. Mitchell, S. R., Harmon, M. E., and O'Connell, K. B.: Forest fuel reduction reduces both fire severity and long-term carbon storage in three Pacific Northwest Ecosystems, Ecol. Appl., 19, 643-655, 2009.
40. North, M., Hurteau, M., and Innes, J.: Fire suppression and fuels treatment effects on mixed-conifer carbon stocks and emissions, Ecol. Appl., 19, 1385-96, 2009.
41. Ohmann, J. L. and Gregory, M. J.: Predictive mapping of forest composition and structure with direct gradient analysis and nearest-neighbor imputation in coastal Oregon, U. S. A., Can. J. Forest Res., 32, 725-741, 2002.
42. Parisien, M.-A., Miller, C., Ager, A. A., and Finney, M. A.: Use of artificial landscapes to isolate factors controlling spatial patterns in burn probability, Landscape Ecol., 25, 79-94, 2010.
43. Penman, J., Gytarsky, M., and Hiraishi, T.: Good practice guidance for land use, land use change, and forestry, Institute for Global Environmental Strategies for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Hayama, Kanagawa, Japan, 502 pp., 2003.
44. Podur, J. J. and Martell, D. L.: A simulation model of the growth and suppression of large forest fires in Ontario, Int. J. Wildland Fire, 16, 285-294, 2007.
45. Rebain, S. A.: The fire and fuels extension to the Forest Vegetation Simulator, Addendum to RMRS-GTR-119, USDA Forest Service and ESSA Technologies Ltd., 244 pp., 2009.
46. Reinhardt, E. D. and Crookston, N. L. (Tech. Eds): The fire and fuels extension to the forest vegetation simulator, USDA Forest Service, Ogden, UT, Rocky Mountain Research Station General Technical Report RMRS-GTR-116, 209 pp., 2003.
47. Reinhardt, E. and Holsinger, L.: Effects of fuel treatments on carbon-disturbance relationships in forests of the northern Rocky Mountains Forest Ecol. Manag., 259, 1427-1435, 2010.
48. Reinhardt, E. D., Keane, R. E., and Brown, J. K.: First Order Fire Effects Model: FOFEM 4.0 user's guide, US Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Intermountain Research Station, Ogden, UT, Gen. Tech. Rep. INT-GTR-344, 65 pp., 1997.
49. Reinhardt, E. D., Keane, R. E., Calkin, D. E., and Cohen, J. D.: Objectives and considerations for wildland fuel treatment in forested ecosystems of the interior western United States, Forest Ecol. Manag., 256, 1997-2006, 2008.
50. Richards, G. D.: An elliptical growth model of forest fire fronts and its numerical solutions, Int. J. Numer. Meth. Eng., 30, 1163-1179, 1990.
51. Ritchie, M. W., Skinner, C. N., and Hamilton, T. A.: Probability of wildfire-induced tree mortality in an interior pine forests: effects of thinning and prescribed fire, Forest Ecol. Manag., 247, 200-208, 2007.
52. Rollins, M. G.: LANDFIRE: a nationally consistent vegetation, wildland fire, and fuel assessment, Int. J. Wildland Fire, 18, 235-249, 2009.
53. Safford, H. D., Schmidt, D. A., and Carlson, C. H.: Effects of fuel treatments on fire severity in an area of wildland-urban interface, Angora Fire, Lake Tahoe Basin, California, Forest Ecol. Manag., 258, 773-787, 2009.
54. Sanderlin, J. C. and Van Gelder, R. J.: A simulation of fire behaviour and suppression effectiveness for operation support in wildland fire management, in: Proc. 1st Int. Conv. on mathematical modelling, St. Louis, MO, 619-630, 1977.
55. Schoennagel, T., Nelson, C. R., Theobald, D. M., Carnwath, G. C., and Chapman, T. B.: Implementation of National Fire Plan treatments near the wildland-urban interface in the western United States, Proceedings National Academy of Sciences, early edn.: 8 June, 2009.
56. Sexton, T.: U. S. federal fuel management programs: reducing risk to communities and increasing ecosystem resilience and sustainability, 9-12 pp., in: Fuels Management-How to Measure Success, compiled by: Andrews, P. L. and Butler, B. W., Conference Proceedings, Portland, OR, 28-30 March 2006 Fort Collins, CO: USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station Proceedings RMRS-P-41, 809 pp., 2006.
57. Scott, J. H. and Burgan, R. E.: Standard fire behavior fuel models: a comprehensive set for use with Rothermel's surface fire spread model. USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fort Collins, CO, Gen. Tech. Rep. RMRS-GTR-153, 72 pp., 2005.
58. Smith, J. E. and Heath, L. S.: A model of forest floor carbon biomass for United States forest types, USDA, Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station, Newtown Square, PA, Res. Pap. NE-722, 37 pp., 2002.
59. Stephens, S. L. and Moghaddas, J. J.: Experimental fuel treatment impacts on forest structure, potential fire behaviour, and predicted tree mortality in a California mixed conifer forest, Forest Ecol. Manag., 215, 21-36, 2005.
60. Stephens, S. L., Moghaddas, J. J., Edminster, C., Fiedler, C. E., Haase, S., Harrington, M., Keeley, J. E., Knapp, E. E., McIver, J. D., Metlen, K., Skinner, C. N., and Youngblood, A.: Fire treatment effects on vegetation structure, fuels, and potential fire severity in western U. S. forests, Ecol. Appl., 19, 305-320, 2009.
61. USDA Forest Service: A strategic assessment of forest biomass and fuel reduction treatments in Western States, Fort Collins, CO: USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Gen. Tech. Rep. RMRS-GTR-149, 17 pp., 2005.
62. Vaillant, N. M., Fites-Kaufman, J., Reiner, A. L., Noonan-Wright, E. K., and Dailey, S. N.: Effect of fuel treatments on fuels and potential fire behaviour in California, USA, National Forests, Fire Ecology, 5, 14-29, 2009.
63. van Wagtendonk, J. W.: Use of a deterministic fire growth model to test fuel treatments, in: pp 1155-66 in Sierra Nevada Ecosystems Project: Final Report to Congress, vol. II. Assessments and Scientific Basis for Management Options, University of California, Davis, Centers for Water and Wildland Resources, 1996.