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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics
A Landscape Model Of Variable Social-Ecological Fire Regimes, Robert M. Scheller, Alec M. Kretchun, Todd J. Hawbaker, Paul D. Henne
A Landscape Model Of Variable Social-Ecological Fire Regimes, Robert M. Scheller, Alec M. Kretchun, Todd J. Hawbaker, Paul D. Henne
Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations
Fire regimes are now recognized as the product of social processes whereby fire on any landscape is the product of human-generated drivers: climate change, historical patterns of vegetation manipulation, invasive species, active fire suppression, ongoing fuel management efforts, prescribed burning, and accidental ignitions. We developed a new fire model (Social-Climate Related Pyrogenic Processes and their Landscape Effects: SCRPPLE) that emphasizes the social dimensions of fire and enables simulation of fuel-treatment effects, fire suppression, and prescribed fires. Fire behavior was parameterized with daily fire weather, ignition, and fire-boundary data. SCRPPLE was initially parameterized and developed for the Lake Tahoe Basin (LTB) …
Four-Fold Increase In Solar Forcing On Snow In Western U.S. Burned Forests Since 1999, Kelly E. Gleason, Joseph R. Mcconnell, Monica M. Arienzo, Nathan Chellman, Wendy M. Calvin
Four-Fold Increase In Solar Forcing On Snow In Western U.S. Burned Forests Since 1999, Kelly E. Gleason, Joseph R. Mcconnell, Monica M. Arienzo, Nathan Chellman, Wendy M. Calvin
Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations
Forest fires are increasing across the American West due to climate warming and fire suppression. Accelerated snow melt occurs in burned forests due to increased light transmission through the canopy and decreased snow albedo from deposition of light-absorbing impurities. Using satellite observations, we document up to an annual 9% growth in western forests burned since 1984, and 5 day earlier snow disappearance persisting for >10 years following fire. Here, we show that black carbon and burned woody debris darkens the snowpack and lowers snow albedo for 15 winters following fire, using measurements of snow collected from seven forested sites that …