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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1990

High altitude aircraft remote sensing during the 1988 Yellowstone National Park wildfires

An overview is presented of the effects of the wildfires that occurred in the Yellowstone National Park during 1988 and the techniques employed to combat these fires with the use of remote sensing. The fire management team utilized King-Air and Merlin aircraft flying night missions with a thermal IR line-scanning system. NASA-Ames Research Center assisted with an ER-2 high altitude aircraft with the ability to down-link active data from the aircraft via a teledetection system. The ER-2 was equipped with a multispectral Thematic Mapper Simulator scanner and the resultant map data and video imagery was provided to the fire command personnel for field evaluation and fire suppression activities. This type of information proved very valuable to the fire control management personnel and to the continuing ecological research goals of NASA-Ames scientists analyzing the effects of burn type and severity on ecosystem recovery and development.

Ambrosia, Vincent G.↗
DOE OSTI2022

Significant Effective Radiative Forcing of Stratospheric Wildfire Smoke

Abstract The radiative forcing (RF) of volcanic sulfate is well quantified. However, the RF of pyrocumulonimbus (pyroCb) smoke with absorbing carbonaceous aerosols has not been considered in climate assessment reports. With the Community Earth System Model, we studied two record‐breaking wildfire events, the 2017 Pacific Northwest Event (PNE) and the 2019–2020 Australian New Year event (ANY), that perturbed stratospheric chemistry and the earth's radiation budget. We calculated a global annual‐mean effective RF (ERF) of −0.04 ± 0.02 and −0.17 ± 0.02 W/m 2 at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) for PNE and ANY, respectively. The complexity of longwave RF led to an uncertainty of about 50% in the ERF at the TOA among climate models. We found that modeled ERF from wildfire smoke was 70%–270% more negative than the ERF of mass‐equivalent sulfate aerosol, highlighting its important role in the climate radiative budget.

Liu, Cheng‐Cheng↗
DOE OSTI2022

Notable impact of wildfires in the western United States on weather hazards in the central United States

Increased wildfire events constitute a significant threat to life and property in the United States. Wildfire impact on severe storms and weather hazards is another pathway that threatens society, and our understanding of which is very limited. Here, we use unique modeling developments to explore the effects of wildfires in the western US (mainly California and Oregon) on precipitation and hail in the central US. We find that the western US wildfires notably increase the occurrences of heavy precipitation rates by 38% and significant severe hail (≥2 in.) by 34% in the central United States. Both heat and aerosols from wildfires play an important role. By enhancing surface high pressure and increasing westerly and southwesterly winds, wildfires in the western United States produce ( 1 ) stronger moisture and aerosol transport to the central United States and ( 2 ) larger wind shear and storm-relative helicity in the central United States. Both the meteorological environment more conducive to severe convective storms and increased aerosols contribute to the enhancements of heavy precipitation rates and large hail. Moreover, the local wildfires in the central US also enhance the severity of storms, but their impact is notably smaller than the impact of remote wildfires in California and Oregon because of the lessened severity of the local wildfires. As wildfires are projected to be more frequent and severe in a warmer climate, the influence of wildfires on severe weather in downwind regions may become increasingly important.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

Prolonged Drought in a Northern California Coastal Region Suppresses Wildfire Impacts on Hydrology

Wildfires naturally occur in many landscapes, however they are undergoing rapid regime shifts. Despite the emphasis in the literature on the most severe hydrological responses to wildfire, there remains a knowledge gap on the thresholds of wildfire (i.e., burned area/drainage area ratio, BAR) required to initiate hydrological responses. We investigated hydrological changes in the Russian River Watershed (RRW) in California, a coastal, Mediterranean, drought-prone, wildfire-adapted ecosystem, following ten wildfires that burned 30% of the watershed. Our findings suggest that sub-watersheds of the RRW have not burned beyond an intrinsic, unknown, threshold required to initiate change. Using paired watersheds, we examined spatiotemporal patterns of pre-and-post wildfire hydrology with a rainfall-runoff hydrological model. Even though these successive wildfires burned 1%–50% of each sub-watershed (1%–30% at moderate/high severity), we found little evidence of wildfire-related shifts in hydrology. As a function of BAR, wildfire imposed limited effects on runoff ratios (runoff/precipitation) and runoff residuals (observations—model simulations). Our findings that post-wildfire runoff enhancements asymptote beyond 30% burn indicate that when a watershed is burned beyond a certain threshold, the magnitude of the hydrologic response no longer increases. Drought and storm conditions explained much of the variability observed in streamflow, whereas wildfire explained only moderate variability in streamflow even when wildfire accounted for >45% BAR. While the BAR in the RRW was sufficiently beyond previously reported minimum disturbance thresholds (>20% burned forest), the lack of hydrological response is attributed to buffering effects of wildfire adaptation and drought factors that are unique to Mediterranean ecoregions.

Newcomer, Michelle E.↗
DOE OSTI2024

Data and scripts associated with a manuscript on a meta-analysis synthesizing stream biogeochemical response to wildfires across space and time (v2)

This data package is associated with the publication “Catchment characteristics modulate the influence of wildfires on nitrate and dissolved organic carbon in lotic systems across space and time: A meta-analysis” submitted to Global Biogeochemical Cycles (Cavaiani et al. 2025). This study uses meta-analytical techniques to evaluate the effect of wildfire on in-stream responses in burned and unburned watersheds. The study aims to provide additional insight into the range of responses and net influences that wildfires have on hydro-biogeochemistry across broad spatial scales, burn extents, and the persistence of water-quality change. This study compiles data and metadata from 18 total publications that includes 1) surface water geochemistry data (dissolved organic carbon; nitrate), 2) climate classifications, 3) year of the wildfire, 4) the time lag between when the fire occurred and when the sampling occurred, and 5) study design of the publication. In total, this meta-analysis draws data that spans 8 climate guilds, 3 biomes, 62 watersheds, and 20 unique wildfires. See Sites_meta_data.csv for citations of the papers used in this meta-analysis. All R scripts and the associated data can also be found on GitHub at This data package was originally published in March 2024. It was updated in April 2025 (v2; new and modified files). See the change history section in the readme for more details. This data package contains five primary folders that include the following: (1) inputs; (2) output for analysis; (3) initial plots; (4) R scripts; and (5) GIS data. The data package also contains a data dictionary (dd) that provides column header definitions and a file-level metadata (flmd) file that describes every file. The “inputs” folder contains a list of all publications identified during the formal web search and an indication of whether each publication was included in the final analysis. Additionally, it includes site-level metadata, catchment characteristics, and GIS data for all publications included in the final analysis. The “Output_for_analysis” folder contains all data frames and figures generated from each R script used for additional data analysis. The “initial_plots” folder includes all exploratory figures that will be included in a supplemental and figures that will be submitted with the manuscript for publication. The “R_scripts” folder contains the scripts that perform all the data manipulations, statistical analyses, and plots. The “gis_data” folder includes shape files for each fire included in this meta-analysis. This data package contains the following file types: csv, pdf, jpeg, cpg, dbf, prj, shp, shp.ea.iso.xml, shp.iso.xml, shx.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Air quality and health impacts of the 2020 wildfires in California

Abstract Background Wildfires in 2020 ravaged California to set the annual record of area burned to date. Clusters of wildfires in Northern California surrounded the Bay Area covering the skies with smoke and raising the air pollutant concentrations to hazardous levels. This study uses the Fire Inventory from the National Center for Atmospheric Research database and the Community Multiscale Air Quality model to estimate the effects of wildfire emissions on air quality during the period from August 16 to October 28 of 2020. In addition, low-cost sensor data for fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) from the PurpleAir network is used to enhance modeled PM 2.5 concentrations. The resulting impacts on ozone and PM 2.5 are used to quantify the health impacts caused by wildfires using the Benefits Mapping and Analysis Program – Community Edition. Results Wildfire activity significantly increased direct PM 2.5 emissions and emissions of PM 2.5 and ozone precursors. Direct PM 2.5 emissions surged up to 38 times compared to an average day. Modeling results indicated that wildfires alone led to a rise in ozone daily maximum 8-h average by up to 10 ppb and exceeded PM 2.5 air quality standards in numerous locations by up to 10 times. While modeled PM 2.5 concentrations were lower than measurements, correcting these with PurpleAir data improved the accuracy. The correction using PurpleAir data increased estimates of wildfire-induced mortality due to PM 2.5 exposure by up to 16%. Conclusions The increased hospital admissions and premature mortality attributed to wildfires were found to be comparable to the health impacts avoided by strategies aimed at meeting ozone and PM2.5 air quality standards. This suggests that widespread wildfire emissions can negate years of efforts dedicated to controlling air pollution. The integration of low-cost sensor data proved invaluable in refining the estimates of health impacts from PM2.5 resulting from wildfires.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS2018

Extreme Air Pollution Events in Hokkaido, Japan Traced Back to Early Snowmelt and Large-Scale Wildfires Over East Eurasia: Case Studies

To identify the unusual climate conditions and their connections to air pollutions in a remote area due to wildfires, we examine three anomalous large-scale wildfires in May 2003, April 2008, and July 2014 over East Eurasia, as well as how products of those wildfires reached an urban city, Sapporo, in the northern part of Japan (Hokkaido), significantly affecting the air quality. NASA's MERRA-2 (the Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, Version 2) aerosol re-analysis data closely reproduced the PM2.5 variations in Sapporo for the case of smoke arrival inJuly 2014. Results show that all three cases featured unusually early snowmelt in East Eurasia, accompanied by warmer and drier surface conditions in the months leading to the fires, inducing long-lasting soil dryness and producing environmental conditions conductive to active wildfires. Due to prevailing anomalous synoptic-scale atmospheric motions, smoke from those fires eventually reached a remote area, Hokkaido, and worsened the air quality in Sapporo. In futurestudies, continuous monitoring of the timing of Eurasian snowmelt and the air quality from the source regions to remote regions, coupled with the analysis of atmospheric and surface conditions, may be essential in more accurately predicting the effects of wildfires on air quality.

MERRA-2↗
DOE OSTI2021

Responses of Boreal Forest Ecosystems and Permafrost to Climate Change and Disturbances: A Modeling Perspective

The north circumpolar region contains a large amount of carbon. This carbon storage is vulnerable due to permafrost degradation and wildfire disturbances under ongoing and projected climate change. Climate warming and wildfires change soil organic horizons gradually or abruptly, and modify permafrost thermal-hydrology and biogeochemistry, ecosystem structures, functions, and capability of sequestrating rising atmospheric CO2. Land models do not fully take accounts of these interactions and its complexity in the high latitude. This chapter describes a terrestrial ecosystem model with dynamic organic soil module (DOS-TEM) and its unique freezing-thawing algorithm, and presents key results of its applications mainly in boreal forests of Alaska. The DOS-TEM explicitly considers interactions of soil thermal and hydrological processes, permafrost degradation and the direct and indirect effects of wildfire disturbances, in addition to soil–plant C and N cycles. We first introduce four modules of DOS-TEM, focusing on its disturbance module and coupling with a dynamic organic soil module. Then we describe and validate DOS-TEM’s freezing-thawing algorithm and development based on two-directional Stefan algorithm (TDSA). Finally, we apply the DOS-TEM at site and region scales, with a focus on model ability to dynamically simulate soil organic thickness under warming and wildfires, and consequent impacts on permafrost in the Yukon River Basin. We conclude that land surface model development is urgently needed to include other critical landscape processes, such as thermalkarst and other disturbances, to synchronize thermal-hydrological-biogeochemical processes, and to incorporate an advanced understanding of biospheric feedbacks to atmosphere and ecosystems. Such a complexity of modeling scope is plausible with advancement of high performance computing.

Yi, Shuhua↗
DOE OSTI2026

IAM-FIRE: a Climate Emulator–Based Framework to Project Wildfire Impacts and Risks for Integrated Assessment Models

Most Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) underrepresent dynamic feedbacks from climate-driven disturbances such as wildfires, potentially overestimating the permanence of land-based carbon sinks. In particular, representing the impacts of forest fires is becoming increasingly important, as these are expected to intensify in the coming years. We introduce IAM-FIRE (Integrated Assessment Model – Fire Impacts & Risks Emulator), a novel framework that enables the projection of wildfire burned area (BA) and carbon emissions (CE) directly from IAM outputs. IAM-FIRE combines a spatial climate emulator, land-use downscaling, vegetation productivity modelling, and an empirical fire model to generate global annual wildfire impacts for arbitrary socioeconomic and emissions scenarios at 0.5° resolution for the period 2020–2100. Calibrated against GFEDv5 observations and using inputs from the Global Change Analysis Model (GCAM), we report projections BA and CE derived from IAM-FIRE for four scenarios: SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, SSP3-6.6 and SSP5-7.6. The model reproduces historical global trends for total BA, including the observed global decline since the early 2000s, and for forest BA. Projected fire trajectories differ strongly among scenarios: total BA range from declines under SSP1-2.6 (-3.36 Mha yr-1) to increases under SSP3-6.6 (+1.6 Mha yr-1). Corresponding total CE show a similar divergence ranging from -15 to +10.6 TgC yr-1. Socioeconomic development exerts a dominant suppressing effect on wildfire impacts while climate change and CO2-driven increases in vegetation productivity amplify fire risk, particularly under high-emissions pathways. Compared with CMIP6 fire-enabled Earth System Models, IAM-FIRE exhibits greater sensitivity to radiative forcing and a stronger role for human-driven fire suppression, highlighting substantial structural uncertainties in future fire projections. By providing a computationally efficient and internally consistent approach to represent wildfire impacts within IAMs, IAM-FIRE enables systematic exploration of fire–climate–land feedbacks and supports improved assessments of mitigation permanence and climate risks in future integrated scenarios.

Rouhette, Theo↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Using NASA Earth Observations to Identify Wildfire Impacts on Hydrologic Functions and Recovery in the Gila National Forest

Wildfires can dramatically influence both abiotic and biotic components of a landscape, including soil stability and chemistry; vegetation health, density, and composition; and water flow and quality. In addition to the immediate hazards posed by wildfires, subsequent hazards such as flooding and debris flow can impact the area. In New Mexico’s Gila National Forest, wildfire events have occurred with increasing frequency and severity over recent years, notably including the Whitewater Baldy Complex Fire (2012) and Silver Fire (2013), which burned over 290,000 acres and 138,698 acres, respectively, according to the Burned Area Emergency Response Team Executive Summary reports. Following a significant wildfire, land and resource management decisions are made, including when and where to focus vegetation and stream restoration efforts. This research is the result of a collaboration between the NASA DEVELOP National Program and the US Forest Service, which aimed to utilize NASA Earth observations to help inform those critical land management decisions. The project had two main objectives: 1) assess the efficacy of post-fire vegetation restoration efforts and 2) analyze the impact of burn events on the hydrology at the watershed-scale. To accomplish this first goal, data from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM), Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+), and Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) were used to study the vegetation health over time of treated and non-treated burn areas. To accomplish the latter, various aspects of stream behavior were examined in relation to burn events, including the runoff coefficient and “flashiness” of streams based on USGS stream gauge data and Integrated Multi-satelllite Retrievals for GPM (IMERG) precipitation data. This will allow land managers to better understand the complex ecological relationship between the cascading effects after wildfire and the greater forest ecosystem.

Madeline Allen↗
NASA NTRS2021

Evaluations of Damaged High-Pressure Compressor Blades in Two Turbine Engines of NASA DC–8

A series of flights were performed by the NASA DC-8 for the FIREX-AQ missions to observe the effects of wildfires and agricultural fires on air quality and climate in selected locations of the United States. Borescope evaluations after these flights indicated accelerated damage had occurred over this flight series to the blades in the high pressure compressor section of all four CFM56-2C1 turbine engines. This erosion and impact damage appeared to vary in severity, and appeared most severe for engines 3 and 4 located on the right wing of the DC-8.Engine 3 had the most flight hours and cycles since last overhaul of 7,152 h and 2,502 cycles. Engine 4 had the lowest flight hours and cycles since last overhaul of 1,354 h and 369 cycles. For these reasons, three noticeably damaged blades were selected from the high pressure compressor for each of these two engines, and then evaluated at NASA GRC using optical and scanning electron microscopy. Engine 3 compressor blades had both erosion and impact damage that were observed and characterized. The erosion damage was associated with embedded particles 13 μm to 42 μm in sectioned width, composed of varied compositions ranging from SiO2 to SiO2 also containing Ca, Mg, and Al (CMAS). The impact damage was associated with the impacts of larger objects at least 650 μm to 850 μm in width, but only small fragments 5 μm to 15 μm in sectioned width were embedded in the impact surface, also composed of SiO2 to SiO2 containing Ca, Mg, and Al (CMAS). On the other hand, engine 4 blades had only impact damage that was observed and characterized. This impact damage was associated with impacts of objects at least 1,480 μm to 2,080μm in width. Small fragments 5 μm to 15 μm in sectioned width were embedded in the impact surface. For one impact, the fragments were again composed of SiO2 to SiO2 containing Ca, Mg, and Al (CMAS). For two other impacts, the fragments were often composed of Fe, and less frequently Cu.

turbine↗
NASA NTRS2024

Assessing the effects of landcover and land use change on wildfire exposure and risk to communities and olive orchards in Mediterranean landscapes

A growing concern in the Mediterranean region is that recent landcover and land use change is increasing wildfire risk, or the exposure and impacts of wildfire to valued resources. However, the magnitude of these effects is not well understood given the widely diverse landscapes of communities, natural vegetation, and agricultural land. In this study, we use wildfire simulation modeling to assess how landcover and land use changes in three areas of southern Greece have affected exposure of- and fire risk to- communities and economically important permanent agriculture such as Olea europaea (European olive) orchards. We mapped agricultural and wildland fuel change from 2000 to 2020 and simulated fuel scenarios in agricultural land to assess the impacts of agricultural land practices, such as understory clearing, on fire risk. We show that wildfire exposure and risk to communities and permanent agriculture has increased in some areas due to natural fuel densification and decreased in other areas, mainly due to agricultural land expansion. These results highlight that wildfire exposure and risk are driven by local conditions including density and location of communities, spatial arrangement of natural fuels and agricultural land, and agricultural land use practices. Human settlement burn probability and modeled permanent crop loss increased with greater unmaintained agricultural area in all study areas, emphasizing the importance of agricultural land maintenance practices, such as understory clearing, to reduce fuel continuity and fire intensity. Ultimately, quantitative fire risk analyses such as this study provide a useful framework to identify areas of concern where either fuel mitigation or landowner incentives to maintain agricultural land in a less-burnable condition could be applied.

Aaron M Sparks↗
DOE OSTI2025

Compounding effects of climate change and WUI expansion quadruple the likelihood of extreme-impact wildfires in California

Previous research has examined individual factors contributing to wildfire risk, but the compounding effects of these factors remain underexplored. Here, we introduce the “Integrated Human-centric Wildfire Risk Index (IHWRI)” to quantify the compounding effects of fire-weather intensification and anthropogenic factors—including ignitions and human settlement into wildland—on wildfire risk. While climatic trends increased the frequency of high-risk fire-weather by 2.5-fold, the combination of this trend with wildland-urban interface expansion led to a 4.1-fold increase in the frequency of conditions conducive to extreme-impact wildfires from 1990 to 2022 across California. More than three-quarters of extreme-impact wildfires—defined as the top 20 largest, most destructive, or deadliest events on record—originated within 1 km from the wildland-urban interface. The deadliest and most destructive wildfires—90% of which were human-caused—primarily occurred in the fall, while the largest wildfires—56% of which were human-caused—mostly took place in the summer. By integrating human activity and climate change impacts, we provide a holistic understanding of human-centric wildfire risk, crucial for policy development.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Quantifying the effects of multiple land management practices, land cover change, and wildfire on the California landscape carbon budget with an empirical model

The effectiveness of land-based climate mitigation strategies is generally estimated on a case-by-case basis without considering interactions with other strategies or influencing factors. Here we evaluate a new, comprehensive approach that incorporates interactions among multiple management strategies, land use/cover change, wildfire, and climate, although the potential effects of climate change are not evaluated in this study. The California natural and working lands carbon and greenhouse gas model (CALAND) indicates that summing individual practice estimates of greenhouse gas impacts may underestimate emission reduction benefits in comparison with an integrated estimate. Annual per-area estimates of the potential impact of specific management practices on landscape emissions can vary based on the estimation period, which can be problematic for extrapolating such estimates over space and time. Furthermore, the actual area of implementation is a primary factor in determining potential impacts of management on landscape emissions. Nonetheless, less intensive forest management, avoided conversion to urban land, and urban forest expansion generally create the largest annual per-area reductions, while meadow restoration and forest fuel reduction and harvest practices generally create the largest increases with respect to no management. CALAND also shows that data uncertainty is too high to determine whether California land is a source or a sink of carbon emissions, but that estimating effects of management with respect to a baseline provides valid results. Important sources of this uncertainty are initial carbon density, net ecosystem carbon accumulation rates, and land use/cover change data. The appropriate choice of baseline is critical for generating valid results.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

Prescribed fire selects for a pyrophilous soil sub‐community in a northern California mixed conifer forest

Abstract Prescribed fire is a critical strategy for mitigating the effects of catastrophic wildfires. While the above‐ground response to fire has been well‐documented, fewer studies have addressed the effect of prescribed fire on soil microorganisms. To understand how soil microbial communities respond to prescribed fire, we sampled four plots at a high temporal resolution (two burned, two controls), for 17 months, in a mixed conifer forest in northern California, USA. Using amplicon sequencing, we found that prescribed fire significantly altered both fungal and bacterial community structure. We found that most differentially abundant fungal taxa had a positive fold‐change, while differentially abundant bacterial taxa generally had a negative fold‐change. We tested the null hypothesis that these communities assembled due to neutral processes (i.e., drift and/or dispersal), finding that >90% of taxa fit this neutral prediction. However, a dynamic sub‐community composed of burn‐associated indicator taxa that were positively differentially abundant was enriched for non‐neutral amplicon sequence variants, suggesting assembly via deterministic processes. In synthesizing these results, we identified 15 pyrophilous taxa with a significant and positive response to prescribed burns. Together, these results lay the foundation for building a process‐driven understanding of microbial community assembly in the context of the classical disturbance regime of fire.

Microbiology↗
DOE OSTI2026

Accounting for linkages between wildfire-driven shifts in plant-microbial interactions and soil carbon dynamics in Arctic tundra

Increasing wildfire regimes in the rapidly changing Arctic tundra are altering the soil carbon budget through increased permafrost degradation, shrubs expansion, and shifts in microbial activities. Whether future arctic wildfires will result in net C losses or gains in the future will depend on complex biotic and abiotic interactions that regulate belowground C biogeochemical processes, including linkages among biotic communities. One important linkage is plant-microbe interactions. While these interactions are likely shaped or altered by wildfires, they remain little explored in the context of successional trajectories. Yet, incorporating plant-microbe interactions in frameworks for defining and understanding post-fire soil C trajectories is critical to predict belowground C responses to future tundra wildfires. Here, we provide examples of and discuss how fire-mediated changes in plant-soil-microbe (PSM) interactions can impact soil C dynamics in the Arctic tundra. We consider different impacts of wildfires on PSM interactions and their implications to soil C dynamics, as well as the nuances associated with particular wildfire regimes (severity and intensity) and successional timescales. We suggest that accounting for plant-microbial linkages in future wildfire-succession interactions frameworks can inform future experimental designs and reduce uncertainties in our ability to predict the net effect of Arctic wildfires on ecosystem C.

fungi, bacteria↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Assessing Drought and Fire Conditions, Trends, and Susceptibility to Inform State Mitigation Efforts and Bolster Monitoring Protocol in North Central Idaho

Escalating severity and frequency of drought and wildfire call for effective and cost-efficient mitigation planning and monitoring protocols. The Palouse ecoregion, an agricultural epicenter in North-central Idaho, is of particular concern as both drought and wildfire present substantial economic threats. The DEVELOP team implemented Earth observation data to assist the Idaho Office of Emergency Management, Idaho Department of Water Resources, and Idaho Department of Lands in updating the state’s Hazard Mitigation Plan by enhancing their drought and fire monitoring capabilities. The team utilized Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI), and Aqua and Terra’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), along with ancillary datasets, to assess drought indicators and map hazard susceptibility. The team upgraded the state’s current fire hazard model by updating existing data layers and adding drought indicator data to support partners’ continued assessment of fire hazard conditions. The team observed Evaporative Demand Drought Index (EDDI) spikes during the highest fire occurrence and burned area years in the study period: 2015 and 2021. Models from dry, high fire occurrence and burned area year 2015 outperformed models from mesic, low fire occurrence and burned area year 2016. The increased understanding of drought conditions and fire susceptibility in this ecosystem will assist partners in improving land management practices.

Ford Freyberg↗