Wildfire Suppression Costs for Canada under a Changing Climate

Abstract

Climate-influenced changes in fire regimes in northern temperate and boreal regions will have both ecological and economic ramifications. We examine possible future wildfire area burned and suppression costs using a recently compiled historical (i.e., 1980–2009) fire management cost database for Canada and several Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) climate projections. Area burned was modelled as a function of a climate moisture index (CMI), and fire suppression costs then estimated as a function of area burned. Future estimates of area burned were generated from projections of the CMI under two emissions pathways for four General Circulation Models (GCMs); these estimates were constrained to ecologically reasonable values by incorporating a minimum fire return interval of 20 years. Total average annual national fire management costs are projected to increase to just under $1 billion (a 60% real increase from the 1980–2009 period) under the low greenhouse gas emissions pathway and $1.4 billion (119% real increase from the base period) under the high emissions pathway by the end of the century. For many provinces, annual costs that are currently considered extreme (i.e., occur once every ten years) are projected to become commonplace (i.e., occur once every two years or more often) as the century progresses. It is highly likely that evaluations of current wildland fire management paradigms will be necessary to avoid drastic and untenable cost increases as the century progresses.

Estimating wildfire response costs in Alaska’s changing climate

“…A similar trend was reported recently for Canada, where a rise in projected area burned resulted in higher suppression costs under RCP8.5 relative to RCP2.6, a lower emission scenario than RCP4.5 (Hope et al 2016). An increase in wildfire response costs have also been observed in Canada since the 1970s and are expected to continue to grow as a result of climate change and societal factors (Stocks and Martell 2016).…”

Examining forest resilience to changing fire frequency in a fire‐prone region of boreal forest

“…Future changes in climate are widely anticipated to increase the area burned and frequency of wildfire (Flannigan, Krawchuk, de Groot, Wotton, & Gowman, ). Wildfire changes will have cascading consequences for ecosystem services, such as carbon dynamics (Turetsky et al, ), water quality (Bladon, Emelko, Silins, & Stone, ), habitat availability (Whitman et al, ), human health (Liu, Pereira, Uhl, Bravo, & Bell, ), and our economies (Hope, McKenney, Pedlar, Stocks, & Gauthier, ). In this context, a key challenge is understanding the conditions where ecological resilience, the ability to recover essential structures and functions following disturbance (Holling, ), may be compromised.…”

“…services, such as carbon dynamics (Turetsky et al, 2015), water quality (Bladon, Emelko, Silins, & Stone, 2014), habitat availability (Whitman et al, 2017), human health (Liu, Pereira, Uhl, Bravo, & Bell, 2015), and our economies (Hope, McKenney, Pedlar, Stocks, & Gauthier, 2016). In this context, a key challenge is understanding the conditions where ecological resilience, the ability to recover essential structures and functions following disturbance (Holling, 1973), may be compromised.…”

Temporal Patterns of Wildfire Activity in Areas of Contrasting Human Influence in the Canadian Boreal Forest

“…Understanding the spatio-temporal patterns of fire occurrence and area burned is thus of foremost interest in Canada in ecological, social, and economic terms. Wildland fires burn on average between 1 to 3 million ha annually in Canada, affecting biological diversity [3,4], ecological services [5,6], and forest resources [7], and require costly fire management strategies for infrastructure and community protection [8,9].…”