Policy & Managed Fire

Description: The topic of “managed wildfire” is mired in complexity, starting with what to call it. This fire management approach has been known as “prescribed natural fire,” “wildland fire use,” “resource objective fire,” and more. All names refer to the same essential idea: leveraging natural ignitions to safely reintroduce wildfire to landscapes that evolved with it …

Smokey sunset over the mountains

Strategies to Reduce Wildfire Smoke

Description: Smoke from wildfires is a well-recognized public health and safety issue. While there have been extensive efforts to help communities be “smoke ready”, most people would still prefer not to live with weeks of unhealthy air quality during the summer and fall. This webinar will address what could be done to reduce the amount …

Smoke from a fire fills the space between two small hills.

Fire Science Research Needs in the Southwest

By Noah Haarmann and Catrin Edgeley Overview Fire science has advanced significantly in the past decade, yet prioritization of, access to, and use of best available scientific information (BASI) among different users remains unclear. This whitepaper presents the outcomes of a survey (informed by key informant interviews) to determine research needs in fire science across …

A large lake surrounded by a pine forest, beneath a blue sky.

Protecting Denver’s Water Supply

Presenter: Dr. Kelly Jones, Associate Professor of Ecological Economics with Colorado State University, Human Dimensions of Natural ResourcesDate: June 22, 2022 11am AZ/12pm MDT Collaboratively-funded fuel treatments are becoming more common in the western U.S. to proactively address wildfire impacts. Water utilities often play an important role in these collaborations and are motivated by the …

Outdoor Recreation & Wildfire

Date: May 10, 2022 11am AZ/12pm MDTPresenter: Adam Benefield, CTC Technology and Energy Federally owned public lands, originally designated to properly manage natural resources, are prone to wildfire in the southern Rocky Mountains, a risk which has increased as a result of environmental conditions and historical land management. Outdoor recreation has become increasingly prevalent since …

Group of people wearing hard hats standing in a green forest.

Collective Action for Wildfire Risk Reduction

Date: April 19, 2022 11am AZ/12pm MDTPresenter: Dr. Susan Charnley, Pacific Northwest Research Station Over the past decade, government policies and programs to incentivize “all-lands approaches” to reducing wildfire risk have emerged that call for collective action among diverse public, private, and Tribal landowners who share fire-prone landscapes. This presentation draws on research from Oregon …

Full-Cost Accounting of the 2010 Schultz Fire

Presenter: Dr. Melanie Colavito, Ecological Restoration Institute, Northern Arizona University; Dr. Catrin Edgeley, Northern Arizona University; and Dr. Evan Hjerpe, Conservation Economics InstituteDate: December 7, 2021 12pm Mountain Time The 2010 Schultz Fire was ignited by an abandoned campfire on June 20 and burned 15,075 acres northeast of Flagstaff, Arizona. Following the fire, intense monsoon …

First Nations Wildfire Evacuations: A Guide

Presenter: Dr. Henok W. Asfaw, Postdoc and Project Manager for the First Nations Wildfire Evacuation Partnership Project, University of AlbertaDate: November 18, 2021 12pm Mountain Time In this presentation, we will present results of research carried out as part of the First Nation Wildfire evacuation partnership in Canada and was recently published in a book …

Tool for Understanding Human-Nature Relationships for Wildland Fire Management

Presenter: Chris Armatas, Research Social Scientist, Forest Service & Aldo Leopold Wilderness Research InstituteDate: September 23, 2021 11am AZ/12pm MDT Wildland fire is a phenomenon that impacts people and communities from the local to the national scale. These impacts are generally entwined with the human and ecological meanings and services that people derive from public …

Indigenous Fire Management & the WUI

Date: March 4, 2021 12pm Mountain/1pm CentralPresenters: Chris Roos, Southern Methodist University; Chris Toya and John Galvan, Jemez Pueblo As residential development continues into flammable landscapes, wildfires increasingly threaten homes, lives, and livelihoods in the wildland–urban interface (WUI). Although this problem seems distinctly modern, Native American communities have lived in WUI contexts for centuries. When …