Cost-Effective Prescribed Burning Solutions Vary Between Landscapes in Eastern Australia

Abstract

Fire management agencies undertake a range of fire management strategies in an attempt to reduce the risk posed by future wildfires. This can include fuel treatments (prescribed burning and mechanical removal), suppression and community engagement. However, no agency has an unlimited budget and numerically optimal solutions can rarely be implemented or may not even exist. Agencies are trying to quantify the extent to which their management actions reduce risk across multiple values in the most cost-effective manner. In this paper, we examine the cost-effectiveness of a range of prescribed burning strategies across multiple landscapes in south-eastern Australia. Landscapes considered include vegetated areas surrounding the cities of Hobart, Melbourne, Adelaide, Canberra, and Sydney. Using a simulation approach, we examine the potential range of fires that could occur in a region with varying levels of edge and landscape prescribed burning treatment regimes. Damages to assets are measured for houses, lives, transmission lines, carbon and ecological assets. Costs of treatments are estimated from published models and all data are analyzed using multi-criteria decision analysis. Cost-effectiveness of prescribed burning varies widely between regions. Variations primarily relate to the spatial configuration of assets and natural vegetation. Regions with continuous urban interface adjacent to continuous vegetation had the most cost-effective fuel treatment strategies. In contrast, those regions with fragmented vegetation and discontinuous interfaces demonstrated the lowest cost-effectiveness of treatments. Quantifying the extent to which fuel treatments can reduce the risk to assets is vital for determining the location and extent of treatments across a landscape.

Remarkable Resilience of Forest Structure and Biodiversity Following Fire in the Peri-Urban Bushland of Sydney, Australia

“…Healthy natural environments within urban settings are recognized as critical to mitigate the effects of climate change and improve livability [27,28]. However, urban development situated alongside fire-prone ecosystems pose challenges to landholders and authorities aiming to conserve biodiversity while minimizing threats to life and property [29,30]. The wildland-urban interface (WUI) has expanded globally, posing increasing needs for interdisciplinary research and knowledge transfer [31].…”

The 2019–2020 Australian forest fires are a harbinger of decreased prescribed burning effectiveness under rising extreme conditions

“…Individual fires were ignited at 11:00 h local time and propagated for 12 h, unless self-extinguished within this period. This time period provides a standardised approach for risk estimation 15 , 57 and was chosen as a compromise between a sufficient amount of time for significant wildfire impacts to be realised 58 , while avoiding the factorial multiplication of weather conditions spanning multiple days. We tested seven combinations of equal edge and landscape treatment (0, 1, 2, 3, 5, 10, 15% p.a.…”

Future fire regimes increase risks to obligate‐seeder forests

“…(2020); Penman et al. (2020), and details of FROST are presented in Penman, Chong, et al (2015). As the simulation polygon must be rectangular, and consistent data across state borders was not available, three rectangles were used to capture as much of the alpine ash distribution as possible while minimizing areas that do not influence the fire regime.…”