IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/forpol/v169y2024ics1389934124002053.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The cost of operational complexity: A causal assessment of pre-fire mitigation and wildfire suppression

Author

Listed:
  • Young, Jesse D.
  • Belval, Erin
  • Gannon, Benjamin
  • Wei, Yu
  • O'Connor, Christopher
  • Dunn, Christopher
  • Pietruszka, Bradley M.
  • Calkin, David
  • Thompson, Matthew

Abstract

Pre-fire mitigation efforts that include the installation and maintenance of fuel breaks are integral to wildfire suppression in Southern California. Fuel breaks alter fire behavior and assist in fire suppression at strategic locations on the landscape. However, the combined effectiveness of fuel breaks and wildfire suppression is not well studied. Using daily firefighting personnel to proxy the quantity and diversity of potential fire suppression operations (i.e., operational complexity), we examined 15 wildfires from 2017 to 2020 in the Los Padres, Angeles, San Bernardino, and Cleveland National Forests to assess how weather and site-specific fuel break characteristics influenced wildfire containment when leveraged during suppression operations. After removing effects of fuel treatments, wildfire and aerial firefighting, we estimated that expanding fuel break width in grass-dominant systems from 10 to 100 m increased the average success rate against a heading fire from 31 % to 41 %. Likewise, recently cleared fuel breaks had higher success rates compared to poorly maintained fuel breaks in both grass (25 % to 45 %) and shrub systems (20 % to 45 %). Combined, grass and shrub systems exhibited an estimated success rate of 80 % under mild weather conditions (20th percentile) and 19 % under severe weather (80th percentile). Other significant determinants included forb and grass production, adjacent tree canopy cover and terrain. Consistent with complexity theory and previous suppression effectiveness research, our analysis showed signs of suppression effectiveness declining as firefighter personnel increased. Future work could better account for the role of suppression with improved data on firefighting resource types, actions, locations, and timing.

Suggested Citation

  • Young, Jesse D. & Belval, Erin & Gannon, Benjamin & Wei, Yu & O'Connor, Christopher & Dunn, Christopher & Pietruszka, Bradley M. & Calkin, David & Thompson, Matthew, 2024. "The cost of operational complexity: A causal assessment of pre-fire mitigation and wildfire suppression," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:forpol:v:169:y:2024:i:c:s1389934124002053
    DOI: 10.1016/j.forpol.2024.103351
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1389934124002053
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.forpol.2024.103351?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:forpol:v:169:y:2024:i:c:s1389934124002053. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/forpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.