An Analytical Approach for Assessing Cost-Effectiveness of Landscape Prescribed Fires

Analytical tools are needed for assessing the cost and effectiveness of large-scale prescribed fire programs. Cost and effectiveness trade-offs for U.S. Department of Interior (USDI) fuels treatment programs were analyzed, with particular emphasis on National Park Service (NPS) hazard fuel reduction projects. A prototype simulation model was developed for the Mineral King study area in Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Parks (SEKI), California. Our prototype process used the FARSITE simulator to examine fire size and intensity (with and without fuel treatment) to develop a cost-effectiveness frontier. Managers can use this frontier to select the most effective fuel treatment strategy subject to the available budget. Other trade-offs can be examined by transforming simulator outputs (e.g., fuel treatment expenses versus suppression cost savings). Hazardous fuels have built up on many U.S. Department of Interior (USDI) lands as a result of cultural and ecological processes. Although USDI bureaus (National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management [BLM], Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Indian Affairs) have reduced fuels through prescribed burning and mechanical manipulation for many years, data are still lacking relating treatment prescriptions to reductions in wildfire risks and hazards. Agencies also lack the ability to identify the most cost-effective fuel treatment for a given budget. Our project has focused on development of a cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) system for USDI hazard fuels reduction programs (Omi and others 1998). Analysis tools are needed that will enable the USDI to model the effectiveness of incremental increases to hazard fuel reduction funding in terms of protecting resources at risk, reducing wildfire suppression costs, and restoring natural ecosystems. Assessing the cost-effectiveness of fuel treatments presents many challenges. These challenges are accentuated when the fuel treatment under consideration is prescribed fire, especially when proposed fires will be applied over a large geographic area such as a watershed. Anecdotal evidence may point to prescribed fire as the fuel treatment of choice for an area, especially in areas managed for ecosystem sustainability or restoration of natural patterns and processes. However, analytical tools are needed for justifying the appropriate level of fire application for an area. Although prescribed fire treatments generally are lower in cost than other fuel treatments (i.e., mechanical thinning, fire also is more variable in its effects; Omi and Kalabokidis 1998). This variability in treatment effect is especially evident (and often desired) in the spatial mosaic created by large-scale fire applications. Further, mechanical methods may not be suitable where land management objectives call for restoring or imitating natural patterns and processes over the landscape, such as in a national park. This paper summarizes initial efforts aimed at constructing a prototype cost effectiveness simulator for the Mineral King study area in Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Parks (SEKI), California. An abbreviated version of this paper was presented at the Symposium on Fire Economics, Policy, and Planning: Bottom Lines, April 5-9, 1999 in San