Themes and Activities
Center activities are organized around several key and inter-related themes. Below is a brief synopsis of each theme and related activities. To learn more about our activities, follow the links given under the specific project descriptions.
Key Themes
Fire and the Wildland-Urban Interface
The reason we worry about wildfires is primarily because humans have developed into fire-prone wildland areas. This situation poses a direct threat to those living in and along the wildland-urban interface (WUI). Past catastrophic losses due to wildfires impacting the WUI and the growing number of people living in these areas indicate that the problem is only getting worse. Important interactions between wildfire and urban growth patterns, given the likelihood of future climate change, are also largely unexplored. Key activities under this theme are the Fire Information Engine Toolkit and Fire Hazard Severity Zones projects.
Back to the top
Effects of Fuels Treatments to Reduce Fire Hazard
Hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent on vegetation treatments, with the stated goals of ecological restoration and reducing fire hazard. In many parts of the western US, these are reasonable goals, but often fuels-related treatments are based on untested assumptions or misperceptions. In many other ecosystems, it is not even clear how far fire regimes are from their natural ranges of historical variation. There is an urgent need for science-based guidance on this topic, and there are important opportunities for greater collaboration and leadership within this thematic area. Key activities under this theme are the Fire and Fire Surrogate study and the Sierra Nevada Adaptive Management Project.
Back to the top
Fire and Sustainability
Fire is a natural and vital process, and the long-term sustainability of many ecosystems is dependent upon periodic fires. While the importance of fire is now generally accepted and integrated into the management approaches commonly used in wildland areas, this is not true for the wildland-urban interface (WUI), where communities and wildland areas intermix. Instead, a continued focus on fire suppression in the WUI has led to the type of fuels build-up that was common in wildland areas before decades of suppression policies were lifted; the problem is further exacerbated by insufficient planning and mitigation on private property. As the WUI continues to expand, it is critical that we come to terms with fire as one of the key natural processes that shapes where and how we live. Most CFRO projects fall under this overarching theme, including the Global Fire Partnership, Living with Fire in Chaparral Ecosystems, and the Berkeley Institute of the Environment sponsored roundtable Natural Disasters and Resilient Communities.
Back to the top
Key Activities
The Fire Information Engine Toolkit
Even in highly fire-prone areas, there are many steps that property-owners and communities can take to reduce fire risk. However, identifying the fire hazards for a specific property or neighborhood can be difficult because the public often does not have access to relevant information. The Fire Information Engine Toolkit has been developed to help homeowners and communities better understand fire hazards at a parcel level using a science-based wildfire hazard assessment and interactive web-based mapping application. Other links include search-by-address wildfire maps for California , up-to-the-minute wildfire news, and tools for researchers.
Back to the top
Developing an Urban Porosity Index for California
The goal of this project is to identify and characterize burnability for wildland urban interface/intermix regions in California. The end result of this effort was a map that was incorporated into the Fire Hazard Severity Zone map updating project that the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is currently undertaking. To determine the urban porosity index, housing density was derived from parcel data and Landsat imagery was used to characterize burnability.
Back to the top
Sierra Nevada Adaptive Management Project
The goal of this project is to learn how to use an adaptive management and monitoring system to understand ecosystem behavior, incorporate stakeholder participation, and inform the implementation of adaptive management for Forest Service lands in the Sierra Nevada of California. Nearly a century of fire management in the Sierra has had the unintended consequence of placing millions of hectares of forest at risk of catastrophic fire. In February 2005, federal and state agencies responsible for the management of forest resources in California signed a Memorandum of Understanding in which the Parties agreed to begin the development of a framework for cooperation among the Parties and other stakeholders. The initial goal is to design and apply a multiparty adaptive management and monitoring system consistent with the Sierra Nevada Forest Plan Amendment. See the project website for more information.
Back to the top
Fire and Fire Surrogate Study
The US Department of Interior and the US Department of Agriculture Joint Fire Science Program provided funding for a long-term study to understand the effects of alternative methods for fuel reduction and forest restoration. This Fire and Fire Surrogate Study is a large-scale, collaborative effort, with the Stephens Lab leading the effort at the Blodgett Forest Research Station in the central Sierra Nevada. Read more about the project here.
Back to the top
The Global Fire Partnership
The Global Fire Partnership is a collaborative project between The Nature Conservancy (TNC), the World Conservation Union (IUCN), and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). The objective of the project is to complete a global assessment of native fire regimes that can be used in decision-making related to biodiversity conservation. CFRO is helping to refine the assessment methodology and related outreach efforts by helping to organize and participating in a series of workshops. The first workshop, co-hosted by CFRO and the Geospatial Imaging and Informatics Facility (GIIF) at UC Berkeley, brought together fire ecology and management experts from Canada, the United States, and Mexico to review the first phase of assessment data for the ecoregions across North America. An ongoing goal of this work is to identify the physical parameters that drive fire regimes at various spatial scales, thus providing an over-arching framework for integrating additional information from scientific experts and other sources. Synthesized information will then be extended to users through a custom webGIS interface, recently developed by CFRO staff and hosted by the GIIF, that can be accessed from anywhere in the world.
Back to the top
Living with Fire in Chaparral Ecosystems
As part of the scientific expertise component of the Living with Fire in Chaparral Ecosystems (LFCE) project, a literature search on fire in Mediterranean ecosystems was conducted and many references from the international literature were compiled into a database. Research on the bushfires in Southeastern Australia has contributed significantly to the understanding of fire in Mediterranean ecosystems. For this reason, a deeper investigation of the fire literature from Australia was examined and collaborations with Australian scientists were started. To promote discussion and possibly further research, researchers synthesized recurring themes in Australian bushfire research and compared and contrasted SE Australia and Mediterranean California ecosystems. Read more about this project here.
Back to the top
Natural Disasters and Resilient Communities
When it comes to natural disasters, many communities are either unprepared for large events or plan only for the worst case scenario – a devastating flood, fire, or earthquake. Therefore, many smaller but more frequent disasters are ignored or assumed to be addressed by large-scale disaster plans. This focus on only the largest natural disasters is akin to treating only the advanced stages of a disease after ignoring decades of symptoms or, worse, failing to take preventative actions. Gathering an interdisciplinary group of experts, we will address a variety of questions related to impacts of small, frequent disasters on ecosystems and communities. While we cannot prevent natural disasters like floods and fires from happening, we can make our communities more resilient to disasters. Learn more about this project here.
