Skip to main content

Displaying 1 - 25 of 97

FOFEM - A First Order Fire Effects Model - is a computer program that was developed to meet needs of resource managers, planners, and analysts in predicting and planning for fire effects. Quantitative predictions of fire effects are needed for planning prescribed fires that best…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Fuels, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: FOFEM - First Order Fire Effects Model, computer program, tree mortality, soil heating, fuel consumption, fuel load, duff, moisture regimes, fire intensity

Humans use combustion for heating and cooking, managing lands, and, more recently, for fuelling the industrial economy. As a shift to fossil-fuel-based energy occurs, we expect that anthropogenic biomass burning in open landscapes will decline as it becomes less fundamental to…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Climate, Emissions and Smoke, Fire Ecology, Fire Effects, Fire History, Fuels
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: biomass burning, human caused fires, carbon dioxide, climate change, fire management, fuel management, smoke management, anthropogenic burning, carbon dioxide emissions, climate change, Global Fire, pyrogeography, fire regimes, wildfire, Impact, Anthropocene, transition, landscape, patterns, drivers

Two specific fires from 2011 are tracked for local to regional scale contribution to ozone (O3) and fine particulate matter (PM2.5) using a freely available regulatory modeling system that includes the BlueSky wildland fire emissions tool, Spare Matrix Operator Kernel Emissions…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Models, Prescribed Fire
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: wildfires, Arizona, Kansas, aerosols, air quality, ozone, particulates, fire management, smoke management, wild fire, Photochemical Model, ozone, particulate matter

Background: In 2012, Colorado experienced one of its worst wildfire seasons of the past decade. The goal of this study was to investigate the relationship of local PM2.5 levels, modeled using the Weather Research and Forecasting Model with Chemistry, with emergency department…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Hazard and Risk, Models
Region(s): California, Rocky Mountain
Keywords: smoke effects, wildfires, Colorado, air quality, health factors, particulates, fire management, smoke management, wildfires, respiratory, cardiovascular, emergency department visits, PM2.5, particulate matter, fine particulate matter, Cardiorespiratory Hospital Admissions, southern California wildfires, oxidative stress, time-series, fire smoke, health, Australia

Fire has a role in ecosystem services; naturally produced wildfires are important for the sustainability of many terrestrial biomes and fire is one of nature's primary carbon-cycling mechanisms. Under a warming climate, it is likely that fire frequency and severity will increase…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Administration, Climate, Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Models, Regulations and Legislation
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: climate change, biomass burning, policy, air quality

The Unmix receptor model was applied to the 2002-2014 speciated PM2.5 data from the IMPROVE site at Tallgrass National Preserve near Strong City, Kansas, to investigate the contributions of prescribed rangeland burning on local air quality. This investigation found the following…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Ecology, Models, Prescribed Fire
Region(s): Rocky Mountain
Keywords: air quality, range management, smoke management, Kansas, IMPROVE, Rangeland Burning, Secondary Organic Aerosols, source apportionment, Ammonia Emissions, aerosol

Landscape fires can produce large quantities of smoke that degrade air quality in both remote and urban communities. Smoke from these fires is a complex mixture of fine particulate matter and gases, exposure to which is associated with increased respiratory and cardiovascular…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Hazard and Risk, Prescribed Fire
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: wildfires, air quality, Canada, Landscape Fire Smoke, wildfire smoke, portable air cleaners, HEPA filter - high effieciency particulate air filter, Intervention, particulate matter, wildfire smoke, cardiovascular health, Indoor Particles, forest fire, Intervention, impacts, Filtration, pollution, exposure

Fine particulate matter (PM2.5) generated by forest fires has been associated with a wide range of adverse health outcomes, including exacerbation of respiratory diseases and increased risk of mortality. Due to the unpredictable nature of forest fires, it is challenging for…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: wildfires, British Columbia, Canada, air quality, health factors, particulates, fire management, smoke management, forest fire smoke, Blended Models, fine particulate matter, exposure assessment, epidemiology, public health

Wildfire can impose a direct impact on human health under climate change. While the potential impacts of climate change on wildfires and resulting air pollution have been studied, it is not known who will be most affected by the growing threat of wildfires. Identifying…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Climate, Emissions and Smoke, Fire Occurrence, Hazard and Risk, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: smoke effects, wildfires, Oregon, Great Plains, air quality, climate change, particulates, pollution, fire management, smoke management, fine particles, forest fires, Impact, quality, health, Area, mortality, perspective, management

Exposure to forest fire smoke (FFS) is associated with multiple adverse health effects, mostly respiratory. Findings for cardiovascular effects have been inconsistent, possibly related to the limitations of conventional methods to assess FFS exposure. In previous work, we…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Climate, Emissions and Smoke, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: smoke effects, wildfires, British Columbia, Canada, air quality, health factors, particulates, fire management, smoke management, forest fire smoke, particulate matter, respiratory effects, cardiovascular effects, epidemiology, southern California wildfires, fine particulate matter, Acute Otitis-Media, air pollution, hospital admissions, Cardiovascular-Disease, Australia 1994-2007, health outcomes, Daily Mortality, climate change

Highly buoyant plumes, such as wildfire plumes, in low to moderate wind speeds have initial trajectories that are steeper than many industrial waste plumes. They will rise further into the atmosphere before bending significantly. In such cases the plume's trajectory will be…
Person:
Year: 2016
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Behavior, Fire Effects, Hazard and Risk, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: flame length, wildfires, wind, fire management, plume, Bent-Over Plume, Highly Buoyant Plume, Fire Plume, wildfire, Near Source Behavior, Cross-Flows, Rise, wind, jet, fires, dispersion

Several U.S. state and tribal agencies and other countries have implemented a methodology developed in the arid intermountain western U.S. where short-term (1- to 3-hr) particulate matter (PM) with aerodynamic diameters less than 2.5 µm (PM2.5) concentrations are estimated from…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: smoke effects, wildfires, air quality, health factors, fire management, smoke management

Among the key issues in smoke management is predicting the magnitude and location of smoke effects. These vary in severity from hazardous (acute health conditions and drastic visibility impairment to transportation) to nuisance (regional haze), and occur across a range of scales…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES, TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: smoke effects, wildfires, air quality, particulates, pollution, Canada, Mississippi, Tennessee, fire management, smoke management, air-quality impacts, forest fires, atmospheric transport, lower stratosphere, stochastic models, plume rise, simulation, system, dispersion, smoke modeling, smoke transport, smoke prediction systems

Smoke from wildfires has adverse biological and social consequences, and various lines of evidence suggest that smoke concentrations in the future may be more intense, more frequent, more widespread, or all of the above. In this document, we review the essential ingredients of a…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Climate, Emissions and Smoke, Fire Behavior, Fire Effects, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: climate change, smoke transport, smoke prediction systems, wildfire regime, feedbacks, coupled models

Satellite based fire radiant energy retrievals are widely applied to assess biomass consumed and emissions at regional to global scales. A known potential source of uncertainty in biomass burning estimates arises from fuel moisture but this impact has not been quantified in…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Behavior, Fuels, Mapping, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: fuel moisture, remote sensing, biomass burning, FRE - Fire Radiative Energy, FRP - Fire Radiative Power

The Fire Modeling Institute (FMI) brings the best available fire and fuel science and technology developed throughout the research community to bear in fire-related management issues. Although located within the Fire, Fuel, and Smoke Science Program of the U.S. Forest Service…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Behavior, Fuels, Mapping, Models, Monitoring and Inventory
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: MPB - mountain pine beetle, smoke science research, Fire Modeling Institute

The term 'backfire' refers to a commonly used method for prescribed burning in which the igniter sets a line of fire that slowly backs into the wind. This technique should not be confused with the colloquial use of the term 'backfire' for 'suppression fire,' which refers to any…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Behavior, Prescribed Fire, Safety
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: fire intensity, backfire

While North American ecosystems vary widely in their ecology and natural historical fire regimes, they are unified in benefitting from prescribed fire when judiciously applied with the goal of maintaining and restoring native ecosystem composition, structure, and function. On a…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Prescribed Fire
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: Canada, fire benefits, ecosystem health, historic fire regimes

Fuel consumption specifies the amount of vegetative biomass consumed during wildland fire. It is a two-stage process of pyrolysis and combustion that occurs simultaneously and at different rates depending on the characteristics and condition of the fuel, weather, topography, and…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Climate, Emissions and Smoke, Fuels, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: carbon emissions, FERA - Fire and Environmental Research Applications Team, fuel consumption, wildland fire emissions

Fuel Loading Models (FLMs) and Fuel Characteristic Classification System (FCCSs) fuelbeds are used throughout wildland fire science and management to simplify fuel inputs into fire behavior and effects models, but they have yet to be thoroughly evaluated with field data. In this…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES, TTRS
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Fuels, Mapping, Models
Region(s): California, Great Basin, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southwest
Keywords: FIA - Forest Inventory and Analysis, FCCS - Fuel Characteristic Classification System, fuel loading, LANDFIRE, FERA - Fire and Environmental Research Applications Team, surface fuels, fuel type characteristics, dead fuels, fuel models, fuel types, wildfires, woody fuels, duff, litter, soil temperature, fire management, fuel management

As forest carbon offset projects become more popular, professional foresters are providing their expertise to support them. But when several members of the Society of American Foresters questioned the science and assumptions used to design the projects, the organization decided…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: forest management, carbon offsets, greenhouse gas mitigation

First order fire effects are those that concern the direct or indirect or immediate consequences of fire. First order fire effects form an important basis for prediction secondary effects such as tree regeneration plant succession, and changes in site productivity, but these…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Fuels, Models
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: FOFEM - First Order Fire Effects Model, duff, moisture regimes, soil heating, fuel consumption, tree mortality

Fuel consumption predictions are necessary to accurately estimate or model fire effects, including pollutant emissions during wildland fires. Fuel and environmental measurements on a series of operational prescribed fires were used to develop empirical models for predicting fuel…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Fuels, Models, Prescribed Fire
Region(s): California, Great Basin, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain
Keywords: Artemisia tridentata, big sagebrush, area burned, shrubs, burn season, fuel consumption

The worldwide 'wildfire' problem is headlined by the loss of human lives and homes, but it applies generally to any adverse effects of unplanned fires, as events or regimes, on a wide range of environmental, social, and economic assets. The problem is complex and contingent,…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Effects, Prescribed Fire, Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI)
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, International, National
Keywords: biodiversity, fire management, fire regime, adaptation, policy, fatalities, disaster, assets

Models of fire behavior and effects do not always make accurate predictions, and there is not enough systematically gathered data to validate them. To help advance fire behavior and fire effects model development, the Joint Fire Science Program is helping fund the RxCADRE, which…
Person:
Year: 2013
Type: Document
Source: FRAMES
Topic(s): Emissions and Smoke, Fire Behavior, Fire Effects, Fuels, Models, Prescribed Fire
Region(s): Alaska, California, Eastern, Great Basin, Hawaii, Northern Rockies, Northwest, Rocky Mountain, Southern, Southwest, National
Keywords: aircraft, fire data, RxCADRE