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Document

Type: Proposal
Author(s): Sue A. Ferguson; Narasimhan K. Larkin
Publication Date: 2003

The Ventilation Climate Information System (VCIS) was completed with Joint Fire Science Program support in 2000 under a 1998-2000 project called, 'Assessing Values of Air Quality and Visibility at Risk from Wildland Fires.' It is a twice-daily, 30- year database of surface wind, mixing height, and ventilation potential for the United States at about 5km spatial resolution with an interactive web user interface that allows access to the data and ancillary information in forms of maps and graphs. While VCIS performs well as a regional and national assessment tool, users have suggested a number of ways that it can be improved to better meet such needs as documentation for the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), programmatic and project planning, and risk assessment at multiple scales. Because VCIS continues to be one of few landscape tools for evaluating and documenting the probability of potential smoke impacts, we propose making the user-identified improvements to the data and web-access system, create online tutorials for specific project tasks such as documentation, planning, and assessment at local to regional scales, and develop lesson plans and workshops to facilitate training.

Online Links
Link to this document (371 KB; pdf)
Citation: Ferguson, Sue A.; Larkin, Narasimhan. 2003. Strengthening application of the Ventilation Climate Information System (VCIS) for multiple-scale planning, documentation, and risk assessment - proposal to the Joint Fire Science Program. JFSP Project No. 03-4-2-05. Seattle, WA: USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. 9p.

Cataloging Information

Topics:
Regions:
Alaska    California    Eastern    Great Basin    Hawaii    Northern Rockies    Northwest    Rocky Mountain    Southern    Southwest    National
Keywords:
  • FERA - Fire and Environmental Research Applications Team
  • mixing height
  • surface wind
  • VCIS - Ventilation Climate Information System
  • ventilation index
  • wind speed
JFSP Project Number(s):
  • 03-4-2-05
Record Last Modified:
Record Maintained By: FRAMES Staff (https://www.frames.gov/contact)
FRAMES Record Number: 6846