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International Journal of Wildland Fire International Journal of Wildland Fire Society
Journal of the International Association of Wildland Fire
RESEARCH ARTICLE

Future burn probability in south-central British Columbia

Xianli Wang A B F , Marc-André Parisien C , Stephen W. Taylor D , Daniel D. B. Perrakis E , John Little C and Mike D. Flannigan A
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations

A Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, 751 General Service Building, Edmonton, AB T6G 2H1, Canada.

B Present address: Great Lakes Forestry Centre, Canadian Forest Service, Natural Resources Canada. 1219 Queen Street East, Sault Ste. Marie, ON P6A 2E5, Canada.

C Northern Forestry Centre, Canadian Forest Service, Natural Resources Canada, 5320 122nd Street, Edmonton, AB T6H 3S5, Canada.

D Pacific Forest Centre, Canadian Forest Service, Natural Resources Canada, 506 West Burnside Road, Victoria, BC V8Z 1M5, Canada.

E British Columbia Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations, Wildfire Management Branch, 2957 Jutland Road, 2nd Floor, Building A, Victoria, BC V8W 9C1, Canada.

F Corresponding author. Email: xianli.wang@canada.ca

International Journal of Wildland Fire 25(2) 200-212 https://doi.org/10.1071/WF15091
Submitted: 24 April 2015  Accepted: 17 November 2015   Published: 18 January 2016

Abstract

Little is known about how changing climates will affect the processes controlling fire ignition and spread. This study examines the effect of climate change on the factors that drive fire activity in a highly heterogeneous region of south-central British Columbia. Future fire activity was evaluated using Burn-P3, a simulation model used to estimate spatial burn probability (BP) by simulating a very large number of fires. We modified the following factors in the future projections of BP: (1) fuels (vegetation), (2) ignitions (number of fires), and (3) weather (daily conditions and duration of fires). Our results showed that the future climate will increase the number of fires and fire-conducive weather, leading to widespread BP increases. However, the conversion of current forest types to vegetation that is not as flammable may partially counteract the effect of increasing fire weather severity. The top-down factors (ignitions and weather) yield future BPs that are spatially coherent with the current patterns, whereas the changes due to future vegetation are highly divergent from today’s BP. This study provides a framework for assessing the effect of specific agents of change on fire ignition and spread in landscapes with complex fire–climate–vegetation interactions.

Additional keywords: climate change, fire ignitions, fire weather, fuels.


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