Abstract: This paper presents preliminary results of research about the development of a forest e... more Abstract: This paper presents preliminary results of research about the development of a forest ecosystem management decision support system (FEMDSS) in Portugal. Key components of the FEMDSS are characterized. The data model and its technological ...
Biodiversity Information Science and Standards, Jul 17, 2019
Motivation and objective: Because biodiversity conservation in forest management planning is nece... more Motivation and objective: Because biodiversity conservation in forest management planning is necessary for ensuring regular ecosystem functioning, resilience and sustainability, the specific objective of this research was to quantify biodiversity at the landscape level in a forest plantation. Case study: Vale de Sousa, Forest Intervention Zone (ZIF), is located in the North of Portugal. ZIFs were formed all over the county with the objective to prevent forest fires, desertification and the abandonment of rural areas. The total case study area is 14.773 ha, mainly covered by plantation forests. The predominant forest species are maritime pine (Pinus pinaster) and blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus) either as pure or mixed stands. Methods:Fuzzy-logic system can serve as a platform for bundling expert knowledge on estimating ecosystem services provision and examining the consequences of contradictory expert views. The method was used to evaluate biodiversity as was recently proposed and demonstrated by Biber et al. (2018) in the context of the European Union (EU) project ‡ § | ‡ ¶
This paper presents results of research aiming at the development of tools that may enhance cork ... more This paper presents results of research aiming at the development of tools that may enhance cork oak (Quercus suber L.) forest management planning. Specifically, it proposes an hierarchical approach that encompasses the spatial classification of a cork oak forest and the temporal scheduling of cork harvests. The use of both geographical information systems and operations research techniques is addressed. Emphasis is on the achievement of cork even flow objectives. Results from an application to a case study in the Charneca Pliocénica of Ribatejo in southern Portugal encompassing a cork oak forest extending over 4.8 thousand ha are discussed. They suggest that the proposed approach is capable of effective spatial classification of cork oak management units. They further suggest that it may be used to select optimal cork even flow scheduling strategies. Results also show that the proposed approach may lead to a substantial increase in net present value when compared to traditional approaches to cork oak forest management planning.
Forest road pavement needs an evaluation methodology based on a comprehensive assessment of road ... more Forest road pavement needs an evaluation methodology based on a comprehensive assessment of road conditions. This research was conducted to evaluate the performance of a method for rating the surface condition of forest roads and eventually to adapt the method to the situation prevailing in a forest road network. The rating method selected as the basis for this experiment was the pavement condition index (PCI) developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. A 53 km of forest roads were selected contained the most influential factors and conditions variability. Eventually, 201 road segments were delineated between 150-300 m in length. Within the given segments, sample plots were set 20 m in length consecutively. It was concluded that the panel scores for distress and surface condition of sample unit and section differed from forest road pavement condition index (FRPCI) and PCI. Linear regression was used to derive equations between distress and PCI score to determine effective FRPCI p...
Forest management can be seen as a sequential decision-making problem to determine an optimal sch... more Forest management can be seen as a sequential decision-making problem to determine an optimal scheduling policy, e.g., harvest, thinning, or do-nothing, that can mitigate the risks of wildfire. Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) offer an efficient mathematical framework for optimizing forest management policies. However, computing optimal MDP solutions is computationally challenging for large-scale forests due to the curse of dimensionality, as the total number of forest states grows exponentially with the numbers of stands into which it is discretized. In this work, we propose a Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) approach to improve forest management plans that track the forest dynamics in a large area. The approach emphasizes on prevention and mitigation of wildfire risks by determining highly efficient management policies. A large-scale forest model is designed using a spatial MDP that divides the square-matrix forest into equal stands. The model considers the probability of wildfir...
Forest policy and decision-makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for... more Forest policy and decision-makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for multiple ecosystem services while addressing the impacts of natural disturbances (e.g., wildfires, droughts, wind, insect attacks) and global change scenarios (e.g., climate change) on its potential supply. This challenge motivates the development of a framework for incorporating concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services in multiple criteria management planning contexts. Thus, the paper focused on both the analysis of the current state-of-the art research in forest management planning and the development of a conceptual framework to accommodate various components in a forest management process. On the basis of a thorough recent classification of forest management planning problems and the state-of-the-art research, we defined the key dimensions of the framework and the process. The emphasis was on helping to identify how concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services may be ana...
Background: Forest policy and decision makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasin... more Background: Forest policy and decision makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for multiple ecosystem services while addressing the impacts of natural disturbances (e.g. wildfires, droughts, wind, insect attacks) and global change scenarios (e.g. climate change) on its potential supply. This challenge provides the motivation for the development of a framework for incorporating concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services in multiple criteria management planning contexts. Thus, the paper focused on both the analysis of the current state-of-the art in forest management planning and the development of a conceptual framework to accommodate various components in a forest ecosystem management planning process.Results: Based on a thorough recent classification of forest management planning problems and the state-of-the-art research, the key dimensions of that framework and the process were defined. The emphasis is on helping identify how concerns with a wide ...
Finding an optimal solution of forest management scheduling problems with even flow constraints w... more Finding an optimal solution of forest management scheduling problems with even flow constraints while addressing spatial concerns is not an easy task. Solving these combinatorial problems exactly with mixed-integer programming (MIP) methods may be infeasible or else involve excessive computational costs. This has prompted the use of heuristics. In this paper we analyze the performance of different implementations of the Simulated Annealing (SA) heuristic algorithm for solving three typical harvest scheduling problems. Typically SA consists of searching a better solution by changing one decision choice in each iteration. In forest planning this means that one treatment schedule in a single stand is changed in each iteration (i.e. one-opt move). We present a comparison of the performance of the typical implementation of SA with the new implementation where up to three decision choices are changed simultaneously in each iteration (i.e. treatment schedules are changed in more than one s...
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), Jun 8, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), Jun 8, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), May 31, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), Jun 8, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Abstract: This paper presents preliminary results of research about the development of a forest e... more Abstract: This paper presents preliminary results of research about the development of a forest ecosystem management decision support system (FEMDSS) in Portugal. Key components of the FEMDSS are characterized. The data model and its technological ...
Biodiversity Information Science and Standards, Jul 17, 2019
Motivation and objective: Because biodiversity conservation in forest management planning is nece... more Motivation and objective: Because biodiversity conservation in forest management planning is necessary for ensuring regular ecosystem functioning, resilience and sustainability, the specific objective of this research was to quantify biodiversity at the landscape level in a forest plantation. Case study: Vale de Sousa, Forest Intervention Zone (ZIF), is located in the North of Portugal. ZIFs were formed all over the county with the objective to prevent forest fires, desertification and the abandonment of rural areas. The total case study area is 14.773 ha, mainly covered by plantation forests. The predominant forest species are maritime pine (Pinus pinaster) and blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus) either as pure or mixed stands. Methods:Fuzzy-logic system can serve as a platform for bundling expert knowledge on estimating ecosystem services provision and examining the consequences of contradictory expert views. The method was used to evaluate biodiversity as was recently proposed and demonstrated by Biber et al. (2018) in the context of the European Union (EU) project ‡ § | ‡ ¶
This paper presents results of research aiming at the development of tools that may enhance cork ... more This paper presents results of research aiming at the development of tools that may enhance cork oak (Quercus suber L.) forest management planning. Specifically, it proposes an hierarchical approach that encompasses the spatial classification of a cork oak forest and the temporal scheduling of cork harvests. The use of both geographical information systems and operations research techniques is addressed. Emphasis is on the achievement of cork even flow objectives. Results from an application to a case study in the Charneca Pliocénica of Ribatejo in southern Portugal encompassing a cork oak forest extending over 4.8 thousand ha are discussed. They suggest that the proposed approach is capable of effective spatial classification of cork oak management units. They further suggest that it may be used to select optimal cork even flow scheduling strategies. Results also show that the proposed approach may lead to a substantial increase in net present value when compared to traditional approaches to cork oak forest management planning.
Forest road pavement needs an evaluation methodology based on a comprehensive assessment of road ... more Forest road pavement needs an evaluation methodology based on a comprehensive assessment of road conditions. This research was conducted to evaluate the performance of a method for rating the surface condition of forest roads and eventually to adapt the method to the situation prevailing in a forest road network. The rating method selected as the basis for this experiment was the pavement condition index (PCI) developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. A 53 km of forest roads were selected contained the most influential factors and conditions variability. Eventually, 201 road segments were delineated between 150-300 m in length. Within the given segments, sample plots were set 20 m in length consecutively. It was concluded that the panel scores for distress and surface condition of sample unit and section differed from forest road pavement condition index (FRPCI) and PCI. Linear regression was used to derive equations between distress and PCI score to determine effective FRPCI p...
Forest management can be seen as a sequential decision-making problem to determine an optimal sch... more Forest management can be seen as a sequential decision-making problem to determine an optimal scheduling policy, e.g., harvest, thinning, or do-nothing, that can mitigate the risks of wildfire. Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) offer an efficient mathematical framework for optimizing forest management policies. However, computing optimal MDP solutions is computationally challenging for large-scale forests due to the curse of dimensionality, as the total number of forest states grows exponentially with the numbers of stands into which it is discretized. In this work, we propose a Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) approach to improve forest management plans that track the forest dynamics in a large area. The approach emphasizes on prevention and mitigation of wildfire risks by determining highly efficient management policies. A large-scale forest model is designed using a spatial MDP that divides the square-matrix forest into equal stands. The model considers the probability of wildfir...
Forest policy and decision-makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for... more Forest policy and decision-makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for multiple ecosystem services while addressing the impacts of natural disturbances (e.g., wildfires, droughts, wind, insect attacks) and global change scenarios (e.g., climate change) on its potential supply. This challenge motivates the development of a framework for incorporating concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services in multiple criteria management planning contexts. Thus, the paper focused on both the analysis of the current state-of-the art research in forest management planning and the development of a conceptual framework to accommodate various components in a forest management process. On the basis of a thorough recent classification of forest management planning problems and the state-of-the-art research, we defined the key dimensions of the framework and the process. The emphasis was on helping to identify how concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services may be ana...
Background: Forest policy and decision makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasin... more Background: Forest policy and decision makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for multiple ecosystem services while addressing the impacts of natural disturbances (e.g. wildfires, droughts, wind, insect attacks) and global change scenarios (e.g. climate change) on its potential supply. This challenge provides the motivation for the development of a framework for incorporating concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services in multiple criteria management planning contexts. Thus, the paper focused on both the analysis of the current state-of-the art in forest management planning and the development of a conceptual framework to accommodate various components in a forest ecosystem management planning process.Results: Based on a thorough recent classification of forest management planning problems and the state-of-the-art research, the key dimensions of that framework and the process were defined. The emphasis is on helping identify how concerns with a wide ...
Finding an optimal solution of forest management scheduling problems with even flow constraints w... more Finding an optimal solution of forest management scheduling problems with even flow constraints while addressing spatial concerns is not an easy task. Solving these combinatorial problems exactly with mixed-integer programming (MIP) methods may be infeasible or else involve excessive computational costs. This has prompted the use of heuristics. In this paper we analyze the performance of different implementations of the Simulated Annealing (SA) heuristic algorithm for solving three typical harvest scheduling problems. Typically SA consists of searching a better solution by changing one decision choice in each iteration. In forest planning this means that one treatment schedule in a single stand is changed in each iteration (i.e. one-opt move). We present a comparison of the performance of the typical implementation of SA with the new implementation where up to three decision choices are changed simultaneously in each iteration (i.e. treatment schedules are changed in more than one s...
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), Jun 8, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), Jun 8, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), May 31, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), Jun 8, 2023
Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisa... more Marta Cortegano-Support and Development Centre (ESDIME) Giulia Muir-Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Sven Mutke-Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR-INIA), CSIC
Forests are a key element in the Portuguese landscape. Moreover, fire hazard is a central challen... more Forests are a key element in the Portuguese landscape. Moreover, fire hazard is a central challenge at national context. How appropriate management can potentially change fire behaviour, fire damage and the difficulty of fire suppression? What are the causal relationships between fire proneness stand structure and forest stand composition? The common objective among the five studies is to address the above issues based on principles of creating fire-resistant forests, underlying factors and implications for active forest management, while sustaining effective fire prevention levels. The ultimate goal is to provide forest managers and policy makers with tools to support their decisions, and more effectively align management policies, plans, and practices across fire-prone landscapes. The first research phase, at a national level using a large dataset of forest stand and fires with a broad spatial and temporal coverage, aims respectively: (i) modelling the annual probability of wildfire occurrence of pure and even-aged eucalypt stands; (ii) developing a shrub biomass accumulation model, and (iii) a post-fire mortality model at stand level and the individual tree survival probability to mitigate damage in any forest stand structure. The second phase focused on specific case studies to forecast the potential effects of alternative forest management (i.e. public, private industrial forest and private collaborative forests), using logistic regression procedures and classification tree analysis (CART), introduces fire behaviour modeling (variables as input and output of FlamMap system) coupled with common stand variables as a tool to (iv) assess potential crown fire occurrence through stand structure/stand composition, and (v) draw guidelines that express the difficulty of fire suppression in those fire-prone forest stands. The methods and tools developed in this research have made several key contributions towards a deeper understanding of the biometric factors, across a range of scales from the individual tree to the stand scale that drive fire occurrence, fire damage and fire behaviour. In this sense, the accuracy of the research findings can provide an interesting insight to support hazard-reduction silvicultural practices in Portuguese ecosystems. In addition, can ensure adequate technical support as a step forward in indicators for risk assessment to the forestry insurance market in their daily development of forest evaluation policies.
Addressing sustainability concerns in Mediterranean forest ecosystems management with the
growing... more Addressing sustainability concerns in Mediterranean forest ecosystems management with the growing incidence of fires impacting the forest areas over the past decades is a complex task. The current framework was driven taking into account several decision support tools of the United States Wildfire Modeling System for wildfire risk management, which focuses on a three-tiered approach strategy calibrated and applied in Portugal. In addition, contains spatial and temporal dimensions to integrate landscape-scale properties required to meet fire management goals, without encroaching budget constraints, while meeting demands for timber values. Explicitly : i) Developing and applying a Forest System Dynamic Model for identifying temporal stand-scale and understory fuel dynamics, including a site and regional percentage of burnt probability; ii) Building for each landscapes fuel population distribution the expected fire behaviour curve trends, i.e. the corresponding spread rate and flame length using EXRATE tool and FlamMap simulator, respectively, thereby allowing the calculation of changes in the annual expected wood loss; iii) Spatially optimize in the Landscape Treatment Designer tool (LTD) the location of fuel treatments distribution. For testing and demonstration purposes, the research considered an application encompassing three properties of pulp mill’s from the Grupo Portucel Soporcel (gPS) in the North, Central and South of Portugal, where eucalypt (E. globulus) is predominant (extent ≈ 3665 ha). A sensitivity analysis was performed by measuring trade-offs among specific treatment scenarios: “treated” vs “untreated” or “treated considering neighbors”. The effect of each scenario was changed by a set percentage of optimal parameters and a series of LTD runs was recorded as a project. The protection of the eucalyptus trees from potential wildfires loss was assumed as a key primary goal, following by a set of quantitative target stand structures, budgets and policies constraints in proportion of area treated, and fire behaviour thresholds for each farm. Parameters decisions were assessed to address the identification of thresholds for radical change in fire behavior, and further insight to support hazard-reduction fuel practices. The accuracy of the results demonstrates the usefulness and relevance of the pursued to calculate the potential effect of treatments strategies on improving fire resiliency. Further, the approach provided an overview of management guidelines for fuel modifications to make the gPS eucalyptus farms in Portuguese conditions more resistant to fire, selecting priority intervention areas and designing effective strategies.
Addressing sustainability concerns in Mediterranean forest ecosystems management with the
growing... more Addressing sustainability concerns in Mediterranean forest ecosystems management with the growing incidence of fires impacting the forest areas over the past decades is a complex task. The current framework was driven taking into account several decision support tools of the United States Wildfire Modeling System for wildfire risk management, which focuses on a three-tiered approach strategy calibrated and applied in Portugal. In addition, contains spatial and temporal dimensions to integrate landscape-scale properties required to meet fire management goals, without encroaching budget constraints, while meeting demands for timber values. Explicitly : i) Developing and applying a Forest System Dynamic Model for identifying temporal stand-scale and understory fuel dynamics, including a site and regional percentage of burnt probability; ii) Building for each landscapes fuel population distribution the expected fire behaviour curve trends, i.e. the corresponding spread rate and flame length using EXRATE tool and FlamMap simulator, respectively, thereby allowing the calculation of changes in the annual expected wood loss; iii) Spatially optimize in the Landscape Treatment Designer tool (LTD) the location of fuel treatments distribution. For testing and demonstration purposes, the research considered an application encompassing three properties of pulp mill’s from the Grupo Portucel Soporcel (gPS) in the North, Central and South of Portugal, where eucalypt (E. globulus) is predominant (extent ≈ 3665 ha). A sensitivity analysis was performed by measuring trade-offs among specific treatment scenarios: “treated” vs “untreated” or “treated considering neighbors”. The effect of each scenario was changed by a set percentage of optimal parameters and a series of LTD runs was recorded as a project. The protection of the eucalyptus trees from potential wildfires loss was assumed as a key primary goal, following by a set of quantitative target stand structures, budgets and policies constraints in proportion of area treated, and fire behaviour thresholds for each farm. Parameters decisions were assessed to address the identification of thresholds for radical change in fire behavior, and further insight to support hazard-reduction fuel practices. The accuracy of the results demonstrates the usefulness and relevance of the pursued to calculate the potential effect of treatments strategies on improving fire resiliency. Further, the approach provided an overview of management guidelines for fuel modifications to make the gPS eucalyptus farms in Portuguese conditions more resistant to fire, selecting priority intervention areas and designing effective strategies.
The present document presents a common vision on the challenges of Mediterranean forests as well ... more The present document presents a common vision on the challenges of Mediterranean forests as well as a Mediterranean Forest Research Agenda (MFRA) that describes the main research priorities for forestry in the region during 2010-2020. This document has been coordinated by the Mediterranean Regional Office of the European Forest Institute-EFIMEDwithin the framework of the European Forest-Based Sector Technology Platform (FTP) Strategic Research Agenda. The consultation process has involved a large number of institutions (research and academic, forest owners, NGOs, and international organisations such as FAO and CIHEAM) in 15 Mediterranean countries. The participating institutions are listed in Annex 2. We would like to thank all those who have contributed to the development of the MFRA. In particular, we acknowledge the contribution made by the members of the
Prospective study of the Portuguese forest sector up to 2071, considering a status quo and a "dev... more Prospective study of the Portuguese forest sector up to 2071, considering a status quo and a "development scenario", with the definition and the cost-benefit analysis of the public policy measures needed to support this development.
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Papers by Jose G Borges
growing incidence of fires impacting the forest areas over the past decades is a complex task. The current
framework was driven taking into account several decision support tools of the United States Wildfire
Modeling System for wildfire risk management, which focuses on a three-tiered approach strategy calibrated
and applied in Portugal. In addition, contains spatial and temporal dimensions to integrate landscape-scale
properties required to meet fire management goals, without encroaching budget constraints, while meeting
demands for timber values. Explicitly : i) Developing and applying a Forest System Dynamic Model for
identifying temporal stand-scale and understory fuel dynamics, including a site and regional percentage of
burnt probability; ii) Building for each landscapes fuel population distribution the expected fire behaviour
curve trends, i.e. the corresponding spread rate and flame length using EXRATE tool and FlamMap
simulator, respectively, thereby allowing the calculation of changes in the annual expected wood loss; iii)
Spatially optimize in the Landscape Treatment Designer tool (LTD) the location of fuel treatments
distribution. For testing and demonstration purposes, the research considered an application encompassing
three properties of pulp mill’s from the Grupo Portucel Soporcel (gPS) in the North, Central and South of
Portugal, where eucalypt (E. globulus) is predominant (extent ≈ 3665 ha). A sensitivity analysis was
performed by measuring trade-offs among specific treatment scenarios: “treated” vs “untreated” or “treated
considering neighbors”. The effect of each scenario was changed by a set percentage of optimal parameters
and a series of LTD runs was recorded as a project. The protection of the eucalyptus trees from potential wildfires loss was assumed as a key primary goal, following by a set of quantitative target stand structures,
budgets and policies constraints in proportion of area treated, and fire behaviour thresholds for each farm.
Parameters decisions were assessed to address the identification of thresholds for radical change in fire
behavior, and further insight to support hazard-reduction fuel practices. The accuracy of the results
demonstrates the usefulness and relevance of the pursued to calculate the potential effect of treatments
strategies on improving fire resiliency. Further, the approach provided an overview of management
guidelines for fuel modifications to make the gPS eucalyptus farms in Portuguese conditions more resistant
to fire, selecting priority intervention areas and designing effective strategies.
growing incidence of fires impacting the forest areas over the past decades is a complex task. The current
framework was driven taking into account several decision support tools of the United States Wildfire
Modeling System for wildfire risk management, which focuses on a three-tiered approach strategy calibrated
and applied in Portugal. In addition, contains spatial and temporal dimensions to integrate landscape-scale
properties required to meet fire management goals, without encroaching budget constraints, while meeting
demands for timber values. Explicitly : i) Developing and applying a Forest System Dynamic Model for
identifying temporal stand-scale and understory fuel dynamics, including a site and regional percentage of
burnt probability; ii) Building for each landscapes fuel population distribution the expected fire behaviour
curve trends, i.e. the corresponding spread rate and flame length using EXRATE tool and FlamMap
simulator, respectively, thereby allowing the calculation of changes in the annual expected wood loss; iii)
Spatially optimize in the Landscape Treatment Designer tool (LTD) the location of fuel treatments
distribution. For testing and demonstration purposes, the research considered an application encompassing
three properties of pulp mill’s from the Grupo Portucel Soporcel (gPS) in the North, Central and South of
Portugal, where eucalypt (E. globulus) is predominant (extent ≈ 3665 ha). A sensitivity analysis was
performed by measuring trade-offs among specific treatment scenarios: “treated” vs “untreated” or “treated
considering neighbors”. The effect of each scenario was changed by a set percentage of optimal parameters
and a series of LTD runs was recorded as a project. The protection of the eucalyptus trees from potential wildfires loss was assumed as a key primary goal, following by a set of quantitative target stand structures,
budgets and policies constraints in proportion of area treated, and fire behaviour thresholds for each farm.
Parameters decisions were assessed to address the identification of thresholds for radical change in fire
behavior, and further insight to support hazard-reduction fuel practices. The accuracy of the results
demonstrates the usefulness and relevance of the pursued to calculate the potential effect of treatments
strategies on improving fire resiliency. Further, the approach provided an overview of management
guidelines for fuel modifications to make the gPS eucalyptus farms in Portuguese conditions more resistant
to fire, selecting priority intervention areas and designing effective strategies.