Lucie Jerabkova Fuel Management Generalist Coastal Fire Centre

1. Forest Fuels & Fire Management Planning LucieJerabkovaFuel Management GeneralistCoastal Fire Centre

2. Why Fuel Management? Provincial Strategic Risk Analysis has identified 1.7 mil ha of forest land around BC communities that may require treatment to reduce the wildfire hazard.

3. Fuels and fire management • 100 yrs of fire suppression has led to a large build-up of forest floor and ladder fuels. • Intensity of forest fires increasing due to higher fuel loading and hotter, drier conditions • Frequency of fires projected to increase

4. Coastal Wildfires of 2009 • All Coastal: • - 528 total fires - 42 interface fires • North Island: • 64 fires at a total cost • of $3,400,000 • 2 interface fires • including V91167 • which cost over • $1,000,000

5. Cause of Fires in Coast Region by Year

6. Hectares Burned in Coast Region (1995 – 2009)

7. Cost Of Coastal Fire Suppression in Millions of Dollars per Year

8. Interface Fires Interface – transition between built-in and wildland areas SPOTTING DISTANCE In BC – within 2 km of structures

9. Interface Fires • More complex, costly, and difficult to extinguish • Typically further away from fire suppression resources and have worse access • Homes not designed for fire resistance • Non-rated roofing material • Open decks • Adjacent vegetation

10. Community Impacts • The impacts from interface fire go well beyond direct firefighting costs to include: • personal injury and destroyed property • business interruption • air quality/smoke production • destroyed wildlife and critical habitat • destroyed sites of historical and cultural significance • lost tourism opportunities • watersheds, timber values

11. What is fuel management? Fuel modification to reduce wildfire hazard • thinning manual and mechanized • pruning • prescribed under-story burning • building of shaded fuel breaks

12. Interface Fuel Modifications Rank 5/6 Untreated Rank 2/3 Treated * fire behavior under the same weather and topographic conditions blah6

13. Glenrosa, July 20th, 2009 FireSmart principles applied Trees pruned, thinned, and fuel removed Resulted in low intensity surface fire only

14. Canadian Wildland Fire Management Strategy (National) The Big Picture British Columbia Wildland Fire Management Strategy (Provincial) Wildfire Management Plan (Regional Landscape Level Planning Unit) Ecosystem Fire Mgmt (Strategic) Smoke Mgmt Wildfire Mgmt (Operational) Fuels Mgmt

15. Community Wildfire Protection Plan higher level Fire management plan CWPPlink operational plans such as Emergency plan Fuel management – component of CWPP Utilization of CWPP for fire management planning Linkage with other plans, tools and jurisdictions Provincial funding

16. Levels of Planning and Treatments

17. Solutions & Conclusion • The costs and complexity are increasing due to hotter drier summers and longer fire seasons, more urban interface, more critical infrastructure on the landscape • The impacts of wildfires are increasing – air quality impacts, evacuations, loss of tourism revenues, watershed impacts • There are numerous resources and options to fund community wildfire protection plans and projects (UBCM, FNESS/NRCAN, JOP, CAF, FIA, “In-kind”) • We are already starting to see the benefits of fuel reduction projects – safer communities, less cost to fight fires, reduced losses in burn areas • There are no easy answers - we have to work together to create fire safe communities, develop fire response plans and create fire resilient landscapes

18. Thank you! Questions or Comments? For more information please contact : MFR Wildfire Management Branch www.bcwildfire.ca FNESS http://www.fness.bc.ca And visit: https://ground.hpr.for.gov.bc.ca/