U.S. Forest Service Wildland Fire
and Fuels R&D Program
USDA Forestry Research Advisory Council
February 19, 2015
Matt Rollins
National Program Leader for Wildland Fire and Fuels R&D
U.S. Forest Service Research and Development
matthewgrollins@fs.fed.us
Science Serving Society
Frontier Fire
Forest Research
Branch – 1916
Backcountry Fire
Mass Fire
Wilderness Fire
Extreme Fire
Fire Research
Division – 1948
Fire
Laboratories
Technology
Development
Centers
Incident
Command
Center
National Fire
Plan
Research
• Fire as forestry
economics
Research
• Fire behavior
Research
• Fire physics
• Planning
• Fire history
• Meteorology
• Fire detection
systems
• Fire ecology
• Fire protection
• Prescribed burning
• Restoration
• Suppression
technology
• Smoke and
emissions
Research
• Fire behavior models
• Fire chemistry
• Fuel management
• Fire economics
• Fire danger rating
system
• Prescribed fire
• Remote sensing
Research
• Applied
modeling
• Fire adapted
communities
• Restoration
• Resilient
landscapes
• Geospatial
US Forest Service
2016 Proposed
Land Acquisition
$65.2m
Payments to
Communities
$316.0m
Capital Improvement
and Maintenance
$242.0m
State and
Private Forestry
$236.6m
Forest and
Rangeland Research
$292.0m
Wildland Fire
Management
$2.36b
Fire
National Forest
Systems
$1.65b
∼ $3.2 billion
∼ 52%
Suppression Cap
Adjustment
$854.6m
U.S. Forest Service
2016 Proposed
R&D-$292m
Wildland Fire & Fuels R&D
$20.5m
Invasive Species R&D
$32.5m
Forest Inventory & Monitoring
$90.8m
Recreation R&D
$4.1m
Resource Management & Use R&D
$86.2m
Wildlife & Fish R&D
$25.0m
Water, Air & Soil R&D
$32.7m
U.S. Forest Service 2016 Proposed Fire R&D Budget is
1.5% of Wildland Fire Management and Suppression
Wildland Fire & Fuels R&D
$47.3m
1.9%
Note: Includes
Additional Fire R&D
Resources from FAM
N.F.P. R&D - $19.8m
JFSP - $6.9m
Wildland Fire Management and Suppression
$2.93b
(Doesn’t include Suppression Cap Adjustment)
Research and Development Facilities Locations
G. Arthaud 8/7/06
USDA Forest Service Experimental Areas
Seattle
Olympia
Wenatchee
#
0
#
0 #
#
0 0
Priest River
Entiat
Coram
Big Falls
#
0 #
#
0
0 0
Grand Rapids#
0#
Deception Creek
0 Moscow
Houghton
#
#
0
0 #
#
0
#
0
#
0
#
Corvallis
0
#
0
Bozeman
0#
South Burlington
Rinelander #
0
#
0
0#
0
#
0#
#
0
St. Paul
Durham
#
0
0#
#
0 Rapid City
#
Syracuse
0
Amherst
Boise
#
0 East Lansing
Arcata
Redding
Hamden
#
0
Forest Products Lab
Warren
#
Logan
0
#
0
#
Evanston
0 #
NRS HQ
Ogden
#
0#0 Reno
0 RMRS HQ
#
0
Delaware
Provo
Lincoln
West Lafayette
Davis
PSW HQ
Morgantown
#
0
#
0
Lincoln
0
0 Parsons
#
0 #
#
0 #
#
0
Columbia
#
0#
0
#
0
Fresno
Princeton
Blacksburg
0
#
0 #
Research Triangle Park
Knoxville
#
0 Flagstaff
#
#
0#
#
0
0#
Otto
#
0#
00Clemson
Albuquerque
0
#
0
Riverside
#
0
#
0
Athens
#
#
0
0
#
0
#
0 Charleston
Monticello
Starkville
#
0
0
#
0#
Auburn
Stoneville
Missoula
Wind River
PNW HQ
Pike Bay
Penobscot
Kawishiwi
Marcell
Cutfoot Sioux
Tenderfoot Creek
Cascade Head
McCormick
Starkey
Dukes
H. J. Andrews
Pringle Falls
South Umpqua
Bartlett
Hubbard Brook
Argonne
Boise Basin
Black Hills
Redwood
Massabesic
Lower Peninsula
Udell
Coulee
Blacks Mountain
Swain Mountain
Glacier Lakes
Kane
Caspar Creek
Challenge
Sagehen
Onion Creek
Silas Little
Great Basin
Stanislaus-Tuolumne
San Joaquin
Fraser
Paoli Vinton Furnace
Desert
Fernow
Manitou
Teakettle
Kaskaskia
Sinkin
Fort Valley
San Dimas
Bent Creek
Sylamore
Koen
Coweeta
Blue Valley
North MountainLong Valley
Alum Creek
Sierra Ancha
Tallahatchie
Calhoun
Scull Shoals
Santee
Hitchiti
Delta
Crossett
Nacogdoches
Pineville
#
0 #
#
0 #
0
0
#
0 Saucier
Escambia
Stephen F. Austin
Chipola
Palustris
Harrison
#
0
Olustee
New Orleans
Alaska
#
0
Gainesville
Fairbanks
Bonanza Creek
Ankorage
Juneau
#
0
#
0
Young Bay
Sitka
Maybeso
Hawaii (proposed)
#
0
Hawaii
IPIF
IITF HQ
Puerto Rico
U.S. Virgin Islands
#
0
Luquillo
#
0
Estate Thomas
Research Stations
areas 50
NorthernExperimental
Pacific Southwest
Pacific Northwest
Rocky Mountain
Station HQ
7
Southern
Laboratory/RWU
58
TOTAL
145
Lands
#
0
Experimental Area
80
National Forest
Laboratory/RWU
Station HQ
TOTAL
58
7
145
Wildland Fire and Fuels R&D
Strategic Program Area (2006)
Three Goals:
1. Advance basic and applied wildland fire science.
2. Promote application of knowledge and tools.
3. Enhance national and international leadership.
Portfolios:
A. Core Fire Science
B. Ecological and Environmental Fire Science
C. Social Fire Science
D. Integrated Fire and Fuels Management
E. Science delivery
• Synthesis and tool development
• Science delivery and application
Science Serving Society
National Fire Plan R&D
• Established by congress in 2001
• 78 research teams across the United States
– initially funded for 5 years, currently in various stages
of re-competition across stations
• Internal peer review process for new projects
• Conducted by FS scientists and university
collaborators
• Focus on applied research, deliverables and
useful products
Science Serving Society
National Fire Plan R&D
Four Major Areas of Emphasis
1. Improve Prevention and Suppression
–
–
–
Fire weather/behavior prediction
Effective/strategic response
Fire and smoke monitoring
2. Reduce Hazardous Fuel
–
–
Fuel treatment effectiveness
Biomass and small tree utilization
3. Restore Fire-adapted Ecosystems
–
–
Rehabilitation effectiveness
Invasive management and protection
4. Promote Fire-adapted Communities
–
–
Structure vulnerability
Community policies and attitudes
Science Serving Society
Joint Fire Science Program
• National, interagency, application focus.
• Managed by 10-person governing board
• Competitively funds 2-3 year projects through
external peer-review.
• Focus on fuel treatment effectiveness,
landscape restoration, wildlife, emissions, and
demonstration projects.
• Budget $13M - $16M, FS and DOI.
Science Serving Society
An effort to collaboratively among all stakeholders
and across all landscapes, using best science, to
make meaningful progress towards the three goals:
1. Restore and maintain resilient landscapes
2. Create fire-adapted human communities
3. Respond safely and effectively to wildfires
Science Serving Society
• Four-year process (FLAME Act)
• Regional-to-national approach
• Enormous amount of stakeholder participation and
input
• National Risk Assessment and National Action Plan
1.
2.
3.
4.
Managing vegetation
Protecting homes and communities
Managing Human ignitions
Safely, efficiently, and effectively responding to wildfire
Science Serving Society
Prescribed Fire
. . A - Use prescribed fire to manage fuels where it is already being used
. . B - Consider expanding use of prescribed fire
. . C - Consider prescribed fire, but on a limited basis
NSTC Fire Science and Technology
Task Force (2014)
• Fire science and technology across the federal
government
• Roles and responsibilities
• Progress on 2008 Grand Challenges for
Disaster Reduction
• Resource baseline
• Gaps and opportunities
Science Serving Society
Fire Science Applications
Science Serving Society
Fire Science Applications
•
Armillaria Response Tool (ART)
•
Fuels Management Analyst Plus (FMA Plus)
•
BehavePlus
•
Gradient Nearest Neighbor (GNN)
•
BlueSky Smoke Forecast System (BlueSky)
•
Gradient Nearest Neighbor (GNN) Vegetation and Fuel Maps, Including
•
Comparative Risk Assessment in Fire and Fuels Planning (CRAFT)
•
Guide to Fuel Treatment in Dry Forests of the Western United States
•
Consume 3.0
•
Harvest Cost and Revenue Estimator (HCR Estimator)
•
Fire Area Spread Simulator (FARSITE 4.0.4)
•
Integrated Forest Resource Management System (INFORMS)
•
Fire Behavior Assessment Tool (FBAT)
•
LANDFIRE
•
Fire Ecology Assessment Tool (FEAT)
•
LANDIS and LANDIS-II
•
Fire Effects Information System (FEIS)
•
Landscape Simulator
•
Fire Effects Planning Framework (FEPF)
•
My Fuel Treatment Planner (MyFTP)
•
Fire Effects Tradeoff Model (FETM)
•
NEXUS
•
Fire Emission Production Simulator (FEPS)
•
Optimizing Fuel Solutions and Ecological Values in Landscapes (FUEL
•
FireFamily Plus
•
Simulating Patterns and Processes at Landscape Scales (SIMPPLLE)
•
Fire and Fuels Extension–Forest Vegetation Simulator (FFE-FVS)
•
Smoke Impact Spreadsheet (SIS)
•
Fire Regime Condition Class (FRCC)
•
Stereo Photo Series for Quantifying Natural Fuels
•
Fireshed Assessment: An Integrated Approach to Landscape Planning
•
Tool for Exploratory Landscape Scenario Analysis (TELSA)
•
First Order Fire Effects Model 5.2 (FOFEM)
•
Understory Response Model (URM)
•
FlamMap 3.0 Beta 6
•
Valuation of Ecosystem Restoration Strategies (VERSTRA)
•
Forest Inventory and Analysis Biomass Summ. System (FIABioSum)
•
Vegetation Dynamics Development Tool (VDDT)
•
Fuel Characteristic Classification System (FCCS)
•
Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP) Fuel Mgt (FuMe) Tool
•
Fuel Characteristic Classification System (FCCS) Fuelbed Mapping
• Wildlife
(WHRM)
Peterson, David
L.Habitat
and Response
others.Model
2007.
A consumer guide: tools to manage vegetation and fuels.
[n=42]
Science Serving Society
How are we organized and resourced to deliver science?
Research
Research
Development
Development
FS R&D Nationally
R&D Fire SPA:
E. Science Delivery
FS R&D
Station(s)
JFSP
Application
Application
Knowledge Exchange Consortia:
Connect to Local Experts
Questions?
matthewgrollins@fs.fed.us