This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
The definition of the structural parameters of forest stands and its vertical and horizontal cont... more The definition of the structural parameters of forest stands and its vertical and horizontal continuity is relevant for a number of environmental applications, such as carbon dynamics studies, sustainable forest management, ecological studies, and fire risk mitigation and management. Obtaining detailed information on tree structures and canopy variables requires extensive and time-consuming field campaigns. Recently, proximal sensing techniques as Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) have been used for forest monitoring studies and have demonstrated their potential to overcome the limitations of conventional ground-based forest inventory techniques. However, accuracy and applicability of TLS techniques for canopy characterization of broadleaf evergreen forests still require further investigation. In particular, a proper separation between points representing woody material, leaves and small branches is fundamental for the estimation of tree attributes and crown characterization. In this work, we developed and tested an automatic procedure based on the DBSCAN point density algorithm to accurately separate points derived from terrestrial Lidar measurements at plot level. The objective was to identify volume of woody material, tree density, and canopy cover of a forest stand. The study was conducted in an area located in southeastern Sardinia (Italy) covered by evergreen forests dominated by holm oaks, with different types of understorey (sparse and dense). Destructive and non-destructive measurements were carried out within three circular plots of 20 m, 25 m and 30 m diameter, respectively. TLS data were collected in field by multiple scans of the three plots. 3D point clouds were processed to isolate trees, soil and understorey. The point clouds were then transformed into voxel clouds (cubic volumes) that were used as input to classify woody and nonwoody components by applying both DBSCAN point density clustering algorithms and principal component analysis. The results show that the proposed method enables the correct identification of crown, trunk, and main branches through an automatic procedure that requires the setting of only a few parameters. Moreover, the procedure does not need excessive computing power and takes only a few minutes to complete the process. Our approach represents a step forward in improving the procedure for measuring forest structure from three-dimensional point clouds. However, further studies are needed to test the capabilities of this method in forest stands characterized by higher and denser understorey and with different tree species (e.g. mixed forests).
Temporal and spatial variations of fire spread and behaviour can be predicted using one of the se... more Temporal and spatial variations of fire spread and behaviour can be predicted using one of the semi-physical or empirical models developed over recent years. The most common simulators (i.e., Behave and Farsite) are based on the Rothermel's original fire spread equation and describe fire spread as a function of relationships between fuels, terrain and weather conditions. The use of Farsite on areas different from those where the simulator was originally developed involves a local calibration to produce reliable results. The local calibration of Farsite requires the use of information provided by actual fires, and the choice of an appropriate standard or custom fuel model. The aim of this study was to analyse and compare the accuracy of Farsite simulations carried out in a Mediterranean area using different fuel models and meteorological input data. The study showed that a custom fuel model specifically designed for shrubland vegetation (maquis) provide more realistic values of rate of spread, when compared with predicted values obtained using standard fuel model. The use of both realistic wind field data and appropriate custom models seems to be essential to obtain reasonable simulations of fire behaviour on the different topographic and meteorological conditions that characterized the time steps of the actual fire. The study showed the capabilities of Farsite simulator during the typical drought season characterizing the Mediterranean climate, when most wild fires occur.
This paper presents a review of concepts related to wildfire risk assessment, including the deter... more This paper presents a review of concepts related to wildfire risk assessment, including the determination of fire ignition and propagation (fire danger), the extent to which fire may spatially overlap with valued assets (exposure), and the potential losses and resilience to those losses (vulnerability). This is followed by a brief discussion of how these concepts can be integrated and connected to mitigation and adaptation efforts. We then review operational fire risk systems in place in various parts of the world. Finally, we propose an integrated fire risk system being developed under the FirEUrisk European project, as an example of how the different risk components (including danger, exposure and vulnerability) can be generated and combined into synthetic risk indices to provide a more comprehensive wildfire risk assessment, but also to consider where and on what variables reduction efforts should be stressed and to envisage policies to be better adapted to future fire regimes. C...
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
The Third International Conference on Fire Behavior and Risk, Aug 26, 2022
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
The Third International Conference on Fire Behavior and Risk
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
In this study, we analyzed the recent dynamics of forest fires in Quercus suber stands in Sardini... more In this study, we analyzed the recent dynamics of forest fires in Quercus suber stands in Sardinia (Italy), Corsica (France), and Catalonia (Spain) for the period 2003-2015.
Despite the need for preserving the carbon pools in fire-prone southern European landscapes, emis... more Despite the need for preserving the carbon pools in fire-prone southern European landscapes, emission reductions from wildfire risk mitigation are still poorly understood. In this study, we estimated expected carbon emissions and carbon credits from fuel management projects ongoing in Catalonia (Spain). The planning areas encompass about 1000 km2 and represent diverse fire regimes and Mediterranean forest ecosystems. We first modeled the burn probability assuming extreme weather conditions and historical fire ignition patterns. Stand-level wildfire exposure was then coupled with fuel consumption estimates to assess expected carbon emissions. Finally, we estimated treatment cost-efficiency and carbon credits for each fuel management plan. Landscape-scale average emissions ranged between 0.003 and 0.070 T CO2 year−1 ha−1. Fuel treatments in high emission hotspots attained reductions beyond 0.06 T CO2 year−1 per treated ha. Thus, implementing carbon credits could potentially finance up...
The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, 2019
Fire exposure describes the spatial juxtaposition of values with fire behaviour in terms of likel... more Fire exposure describes the spatial juxtaposition of values with fire behaviour in terms of likelihood and intensity. Wildfire exposure analysis is based on the estimation of the potential wildfire intensity and on the burn probability. Fire modelling can produce spatially explicit information on fire spread and behaviour, and offers a feasible method to simulate, map, and analyse fire exposure. FlamMap Minimum Travel Time (MTT) algorithm (Finney, 2006) was used to conduct wildfire simulations considering historical data of fuel moisture conditions and winds, as well as the most frequent wind directions and historical ignition locations (2005-2018). Analysis was conducted on spatial and quantitative variations in selected fire hazard and exposure factors, namely Burn Probability (BP), Conditional Flame Length (CFL) and Fire Size (F). We observed pronounced spatial variations among and between municipalities in the factors, especially for those in the northern and southern parts of Ardabil. The variations across the burnable area of the municipalities can be fundamentally related to a number of factors, including spatial variation in ignition locations, fuel moisture and load, weather conditions, and topography of the terrain. The findings can provide information and support in wildfire management planning and fire risk mitigation activities.
Wildfire simulators based on empirical or physical models need to be locally calibrated and valid... more Wildfire simulators based on empirical or physical models need to be locally calibrated and validated when used under conditions that differ from those where the simulators were originally developed. This study aims to calibrate the FARSITE fire spread model considering a set of recent wildfires that occurred in northern Iranian forests. Sitespecific fuel models in the study areas were selected by sampling the main natural vegetation type complexes and assigning standard fuel models. Overall, simulated fires presented reliable outputs that accurately replicated the observed fire perimeters and behavior. Standard fuel models of Scott and Burgan (2005) afforded better accuracy in the simulated fire perimeters than the standard fuel models of Anderson (1982). The best match between observed and modeled burned areas was observed on herbaceous fuel models. Fire modeling showed a high potential for estimating spatial variability in fire spread and behavior in the study areas. This work represents a first step in the application of fire spread modeling in northern Iran for wildfire risk monitoring and management.
A navegação consulta e descarregamento dos títulos inseridos nas Bibliotecas Digitais UC Digitali... more A navegação consulta e descarregamento dos títulos inseridos nas Bibliotecas Digitais UC Digitalis, UC Pombalina e UC Impactum, pressupõem a aceitação plena e sem reservas dos Termos e Condições de Uso destas Bibliotecas Digitais, disponíveis em https://digitalis.uc.pt/pt-pt/termos. Conforme exposto nos referidos Termos e Condições de Uso, o descarregamento de títulos de acesso restrito requer uma licença válida de autorização devendo o utilizador aceder ao(s) documento(s) a partir de um endereço de IP da instituição detentora da supramencionada licença. Ao utilizador é apenas permitido o descarregamento para uso pessoal, pelo que o emprego do(s) título(s) descarregado(s) para outro fim, designadamente comercial, carece de autorização do respetivo autor ou editor da obra. Na medida em que todas as obras da UC Digitalis se encontram protegidas pelo Código do Direito de Autor e Direitos Conexos e demais legislação aplicável, toda a cópia, parcial ou total, deste documento, nos casos em que é legalmente admitida, deverá conter ou fazer-se acompanhar por este aviso.
This research shows the potential use of cross-boundary fire modeling systems at the pan-European... more This research shows the potential use of cross-boundary fire modeling systems at the pan-European level. Despite the growing interest in building fire-resilient cultural landscapes, European Union (EU) level efforts have been reactive and focused on early detection, fire propagation monitoring, and perimeter mapping rather than predicting where the disaster can potentially occur to develop a comprehensive wildfire management strategy. We propose a modeling system that integrates wildfire occurrence models and observed fire-weather scenarios with a fire spread model to generate the probabilistic risk components, i.e., wildfire likelihood and hazard estimates. We selected four NUTS-2 level administrative division pilot sites from different fire-prone countries to implement the modeling system. The Europeanlevel pyromes were first delineated based on ecoregions and historical wildfire activity. We then generated human and lightning wildfire occurrence models to display the ignition points. Remote sensing products were used to derive fire spread modeling spatial input data such as surface fuels and canopy metrics. Global atmospheric products were used to calculate the fuel moisture content with physical models and determine the most frequent wind scenarios for each pyrome. We then used the Minimum Travel Time algorithm to model the fire footprints that correspond to 10,000 years or synthetic iterations. This modeling approach accounted for the spatial variation of ignition locations and the changing weather conditions across the different pyromes within each pilot site. The modeling results include the annual burn probability and fire intensity rasters, and fire perimeter vector outputs. Modeled burn patterns showed a close agreement with observed fire size distributions. We compared this modeling system with previous works to explain why stochastic fire modeling is essential to assess wildfire exposure of natural values at risk and human communities. Our results may help predict future catastrophic fires and provide quantitative estimates to identify high-priority management areas within vast regions. The probabilistic predictions generated in this work represent the foundation for developing longterm adaptation strategies to better coexist with fire. This work is also a demonstration of how this modeling system is replicable in any European country.
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
Accurate and spatially explicit information on forest fuels becomes essential to designing an int... more Accurate and spatially explicit information on forest fuels becomes essential to designing an integrated fire risk management strategy, as fuel characteristics are critical for fire danger estimation, fire propagation, and emissions modelling, among other aspects. This paper proposes a new European fuel classification system that can be used for different spatial scales and purposes (propagation, behaviour, and emissions). The proposed classification system is hierarchical and encompasses a total of 85 fuel types, grouped into six main fuel categories (forest, shrubland, grassland, cropland, wet and peat/semi-peat land, and urban), plus a nonfuel category. For the forest cover, fuel types include two vertical strata, overstorey and understorey, to account for both surface and canopy fuels. In addition, this paper presents the methods to map fuel types at the European scale, including the first-level of the classification system. Land cover, biogeographic datasets, and bioclimatic modelling were used. The final map, which is publicly available (https://doi.org/10.21950/YABYCN; Aragoneses et al., 2022a), included 20 fuel categories at 1 km spatial resolution. A first assessment of this map was performed using field information obtained from LUCAS (Land Use and Coverage Area frame Survey), complemented with high-resolution data. This validation exercise provided an overall accuracy of 88 % for the main fuel types and 81 % for all mapped fuel types. To facilitate the use of this fuel dataset in fire behaviour modelling, an assignment of fuel parameters to each fuel type was performed by developing a crosswalk to the standard fuel models defined by Scott and Burgan (2005; FBFMs-Fire Behavior Fuel Models), considering European climate diversity. This work has been developed within the framework of the FirEUrisk project, which aims to create a European-integrated strategy for fire danger assessment, reduction, and adaptation.
Effective landscape-scale fuel management strategies are essential for reducing wildfire risk in ... more Effective landscape-scale fuel management strategies are essential for reducing wildfire risk in Mediterranean fire-prone areas. In this study, the minimum travel time (MTT) fire-spread algorithm as implemented in FlamMap was applied to assess the potential of alternative fuel treatments for lowering wildfire losses in a 5,740-ha study area in eastern Sardinia, Italy. Twenty-seven wildfires at 10-m resolution were simulated considering three wind speeds (15, 18, and 21 km h−1) to compare fuel treatments: no treatment (NT), irrigated agroforestry areas with shrub clearing (T1), prescribed fire in eucalyptus stands (T2), and irrigated grasslands (T3). The simulations replicated a recent large wildfire that occurred in the study area (Orrì wildfire, 2019) and considered the weather and fuel moisture conditions associated with this event. The average wildfire exposure outputs (burned area, probability of burning, conditional flame length, potential crown fire occurrence, and surfaces wi...
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
The definition of the structural parameters of forest stands and its vertical and horizontal cont... more The definition of the structural parameters of forest stands and its vertical and horizontal continuity is relevant for a number of environmental applications, such as carbon dynamics studies, sustainable forest management, ecological studies, and fire risk mitigation and management. Obtaining detailed information on tree structures and canopy variables requires extensive and time-consuming field campaigns. Recently, proximal sensing techniques as Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) have been used for forest monitoring studies and have demonstrated their potential to overcome the limitations of conventional ground-based forest inventory techniques. However, accuracy and applicability of TLS techniques for canopy characterization of broadleaf evergreen forests still require further investigation. In particular, a proper separation between points representing woody material, leaves and small branches is fundamental for the estimation of tree attributes and crown characterization. In this work, we developed and tested an automatic procedure based on the DBSCAN point density algorithm to accurately separate points derived from terrestrial Lidar measurements at plot level. The objective was to identify volume of woody material, tree density, and canopy cover of a forest stand. The study was conducted in an area located in southeastern Sardinia (Italy) covered by evergreen forests dominated by holm oaks, with different types of understorey (sparse and dense). Destructive and non-destructive measurements were carried out within three circular plots of 20 m, 25 m and 30 m diameter, respectively. TLS data were collected in field by multiple scans of the three plots. 3D point clouds were processed to isolate trees, soil and understorey. The point clouds were then transformed into voxel clouds (cubic volumes) that were used as input to classify woody and nonwoody components by applying both DBSCAN point density clustering algorithms and principal component analysis. The results show that the proposed method enables the correct identification of crown, trunk, and main branches through an automatic procedure that requires the setting of only a few parameters. Moreover, the procedure does not need excessive computing power and takes only a few minutes to complete the process. Our approach represents a step forward in improving the procedure for measuring forest structure from three-dimensional point clouds. However, further studies are needed to test the capabilities of this method in forest stands characterized by higher and denser understorey and with different tree species (e.g. mixed forests).
Temporal and spatial variations of fire spread and behaviour can be predicted using one of the se... more Temporal and spatial variations of fire spread and behaviour can be predicted using one of the semi-physical or empirical models developed over recent years. The most common simulators (i.e., Behave and Farsite) are based on the Rothermel's original fire spread equation and describe fire spread as a function of relationships between fuels, terrain and weather conditions. The use of Farsite on areas different from those where the simulator was originally developed involves a local calibration to produce reliable results. The local calibration of Farsite requires the use of information provided by actual fires, and the choice of an appropriate standard or custom fuel model. The aim of this study was to analyse and compare the accuracy of Farsite simulations carried out in a Mediterranean area using different fuel models and meteorological input data. The study showed that a custom fuel model specifically designed for shrubland vegetation (maquis) provide more realistic values of rate of spread, when compared with predicted values obtained using standard fuel model. The use of both realistic wind field data and appropriate custom models seems to be essential to obtain reasonable simulations of fire behaviour on the different topographic and meteorological conditions that characterized the time steps of the actual fire. The study showed the capabilities of Farsite simulator during the typical drought season characterizing the Mediterranean climate, when most wild fires occur.
This paper presents a review of concepts related to wildfire risk assessment, including the deter... more This paper presents a review of concepts related to wildfire risk assessment, including the determination of fire ignition and propagation (fire danger), the extent to which fire may spatially overlap with valued assets (exposure), and the potential losses and resilience to those losses (vulnerability). This is followed by a brief discussion of how these concepts can be integrated and connected to mitigation and adaptation efforts. We then review operational fire risk systems in place in various parts of the world. Finally, we propose an integrated fire risk system being developed under the FirEUrisk European project, as an example of how the different risk components (including danger, exposure and vulnerability) can be generated and combined into synthetic risk indices to provide a more comprehensive wildfire risk assessment, but also to consider where and on what variables reduction efforts should be stressed and to envisage policies to be better adapted to future fire regimes. C...
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
The Third International Conference on Fire Behavior and Risk, Aug 26, 2022
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
The Third International Conference on Fire Behavior and Risk
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
In this study, we analyzed the recent dynamics of forest fires in Quercus suber stands in Sardini... more In this study, we analyzed the recent dynamics of forest fires in Quercus suber stands in Sardinia (Italy), Corsica (France), and Catalonia (Spain) for the period 2003-2015.
Despite the need for preserving the carbon pools in fire-prone southern European landscapes, emis... more Despite the need for preserving the carbon pools in fire-prone southern European landscapes, emission reductions from wildfire risk mitigation are still poorly understood. In this study, we estimated expected carbon emissions and carbon credits from fuel management projects ongoing in Catalonia (Spain). The planning areas encompass about 1000 km2 and represent diverse fire regimes and Mediterranean forest ecosystems. We first modeled the burn probability assuming extreme weather conditions and historical fire ignition patterns. Stand-level wildfire exposure was then coupled with fuel consumption estimates to assess expected carbon emissions. Finally, we estimated treatment cost-efficiency and carbon credits for each fuel management plan. Landscape-scale average emissions ranged between 0.003 and 0.070 T CO2 year−1 ha−1. Fuel treatments in high emission hotspots attained reductions beyond 0.06 T CO2 year−1 per treated ha. Thus, implementing carbon credits could potentially finance up...
The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, 2019
Fire exposure describes the spatial juxtaposition of values with fire behaviour in terms of likel... more Fire exposure describes the spatial juxtaposition of values with fire behaviour in terms of likelihood and intensity. Wildfire exposure analysis is based on the estimation of the potential wildfire intensity and on the burn probability. Fire modelling can produce spatially explicit information on fire spread and behaviour, and offers a feasible method to simulate, map, and analyse fire exposure. FlamMap Minimum Travel Time (MTT) algorithm (Finney, 2006) was used to conduct wildfire simulations considering historical data of fuel moisture conditions and winds, as well as the most frequent wind directions and historical ignition locations (2005-2018). Analysis was conducted on spatial and quantitative variations in selected fire hazard and exposure factors, namely Burn Probability (BP), Conditional Flame Length (CFL) and Fire Size (F). We observed pronounced spatial variations among and between municipalities in the factors, especially for those in the northern and southern parts of Ardabil. The variations across the burnable area of the municipalities can be fundamentally related to a number of factors, including spatial variation in ignition locations, fuel moisture and load, weather conditions, and topography of the terrain. The findings can provide information and support in wildfire management planning and fire risk mitigation activities.
Wildfire simulators based on empirical or physical models need to be locally calibrated and valid... more Wildfire simulators based on empirical or physical models need to be locally calibrated and validated when used under conditions that differ from those where the simulators were originally developed. This study aims to calibrate the FARSITE fire spread model considering a set of recent wildfires that occurred in northern Iranian forests. Sitespecific fuel models in the study areas were selected by sampling the main natural vegetation type complexes and assigning standard fuel models. Overall, simulated fires presented reliable outputs that accurately replicated the observed fire perimeters and behavior. Standard fuel models of Scott and Burgan (2005) afforded better accuracy in the simulated fire perimeters than the standard fuel models of Anderson (1982). The best match between observed and modeled burned areas was observed on herbaceous fuel models. Fire modeling showed a high potential for estimating spatial variability in fire spread and behavior in the study areas. This work represents a first step in the application of fire spread modeling in northern Iran for wildfire risk monitoring and management.
A navegação consulta e descarregamento dos títulos inseridos nas Bibliotecas Digitais UC Digitali... more A navegação consulta e descarregamento dos títulos inseridos nas Bibliotecas Digitais UC Digitalis, UC Pombalina e UC Impactum, pressupõem a aceitação plena e sem reservas dos Termos e Condições de Uso destas Bibliotecas Digitais, disponíveis em https://digitalis.uc.pt/pt-pt/termos. Conforme exposto nos referidos Termos e Condições de Uso, o descarregamento de títulos de acesso restrito requer uma licença válida de autorização devendo o utilizador aceder ao(s) documento(s) a partir de um endereço de IP da instituição detentora da supramencionada licença. Ao utilizador é apenas permitido o descarregamento para uso pessoal, pelo que o emprego do(s) título(s) descarregado(s) para outro fim, designadamente comercial, carece de autorização do respetivo autor ou editor da obra. Na medida em que todas as obras da UC Digitalis se encontram protegidas pelo Código do Direito de Autor e Direitos Conexos e demais legislação aplicável, toda a cópia, parcial ou total, deste documento, nos casos em que é legalmente admitida, deverá conter ou fazer-se acompanhar por este aviso.
This research shows the potential use of cross-boundary fire modeling systems at the pan-European... more This research shows the potential use of cross-boundary fire modeling systems at the pan-European level. Despite the growing interest in building fire-resilient cultural landscapes, European Union (EU) level efforts have been reactive and focused on early detection, fire propagation monitoring, and perimeter mapping rather than predicting where the disaster can potentially occur to develop a comprehensive wildfire management strategy. We propose a modeling system that integrates wildfire occurrence models and observed fire-weather scenarios with a fire spread model to generate the probabilistic risk components, i.e., wildfire likelihood and hazard estimates. We selected four NUTS-2 level administrative division pilot sites from different fire-prone countries to implement the modeling system. The Europeanlevel pyromes were first delineated based on ecoregions and historical wildfire activity. We then generated human and lightning wildfire occurrence models to display the ignition points. Remote sensing products were used to derive fire spread modeling spatial input data such as surface fuels and canopy metrics. Global atmospheric products were used to calculate the fuel moisture content with physical models and determine the most frequent wind scenarios for each pyrome. We then used the Minimum Travel Time algorithm to model the fire footprints that correspond to 10,000 years or synthetic iterations. This modeling approach accounted for the spatial variation of ignition locations and the changing weather conditions across the different pyromes within each pilot site. The modeling results include the annual burn probability and fire intensity rasters, and fire perimeter vector outputs. Modeled burn patterns showed a close agreement with observed fire size distributions. We compared this modeling system with previous works to explain why stochastic fire modeling is essential to assess wildfire exposure of natural values at risk and human communities. Our results may help predict future catastrophic fires and provide quantitative estimates to identify high-priority management areas within vast regions. The probabilistic predictions generated in this work represent the foundation for developing longterm adaptation strategies to better coexist with fire. This work is also a demonstration of how this modeling system is replicable in any European country.
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
Accurate and spatially explicit information on forest fuels becomes essential to designing an int... more Accurate and spatially explicit information on forest fuels becomes essential to designing an integrated fire risk management strategy, as fuel characteristics are critical for fire danger estimation, fire propagation, and emissions modelling, among other aspects. This paper proposes a new European fuel classification system that can be used for different spatial scales and purposes (propagation, behaviour, and emissions). The proposed classification system is hierarchical and encompasses a total of 85 fuel types, grouped into six main fuel categories (forest, shrubland, grassland, cropland, wet and peat/semi-peat land, and urban), plus a nonfuel category. For the forest cover, fuel types include two vertical strata, overstorey and understorey, to account for both surface and canopy fuels. In addition, this paper presents the methods to map fuel types at the European scale, including the first-level of the classification system. Land cover, biogeographic datasets, and bioclimatic modelling were used. The final map, which is publicly available (https://doi.org/10.21950/YABYCN; Aragoneses et al., 2022a), included 20 fuel categories at 1 km spatial resolution. A first assessment of this map was performed using field information obtained from LUCAS (Land Use and Coverage Area frame Survey), complemented with high-resolution data. This validation exercise provided an overall accuracy of 88 % for the main fuel types and 81 % for all mapped fuel types. To facilitate the use of this fuel dataset in fire behaviour modelling, an assignment of fuel parameters to each fuel type was performed by developing a crosswalk to the standard fuel models defined by Scott and Burgan (2005; FBFMs-Fire Behavior Fuel Models), considering European climate diversity. This work has been developed within the framework of the FirEUrisk project, which aims to create a European-integrated strategy for fire danger assessment, reduction, and adaptation.
Effective landscape-scale fuel management strategies are essential for reducing wildfire risk in ... more Effective landscape-scale fuel management strategies are essential for reducing wildfire risk in Mediterranean fire-prone areas. In this study, the minimum travel time (MTT) fire-spread algorithm as implemented in FlamMap was applied to assess the potential of alternative fuel treatments for lowering wildfire losses in a 5,740-ha study area in eastern Sardinia, Italy. Twenty-seven wildfires at 10-m resolution were simulated considering three wind speeds (15, 18, and 21 km h−1) to compare fuel treatments: no treatment (NT), irrigated agroforestry areas with shrub clearing (T1), prescribed fire in eucalyptus stands (T2), and irrigated grasslands (T3). The simulations replicated a recent large wildfire that occurred in the study area (Orrì wildfire, 2019) and considered the weather and fuel moisture conditions associated with this event. The average wildfire exposure outputs (burned area, probability of burning, conditional flame length, potential crown fire occurrence, and surfaces wi...
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