Citation

Driscoll DA, Bode M, Bradstock RA, Keith DA, Penman TD, Price OF. Conserv. Biol. 2015; 30(1): 196-205.

Affiliation

Centre for Environmental Risk Management of Bushfires, Institute of Conservation Biology and Environmental Management, University of Wollongong, NSW, 2522, Australia.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2015, Society for Conservation Biology, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/cobi.12580

PMID

26148692

Abstract

Management strategies to reduce the risks to human life and property from wildfire commonly involve burning native vegetation. However, planned burning can conflict with other societal objectives such as human health and biodiversity conservation. These conflicts are likely to intensify as fire regimes change under future climates and as growing human populations encroach further into fire-prone ecosystems. Decisions about managing fire risks are therefore complex and warrant more sophisticated approaches than are usually applied. We demonstrate a multi-criteria decision making approach (MCDA) with potential to improve fire management outcomes. For a case study from a highly populated, biodiverse and flammable wildland-urban interface, we considered the effects of 22 planned burning options on eight objectives: house protection, water quality, carbon emissions/human health, and five distinct species types. MCDA identified a small number of management options (burning forest adjacent to houses) that performed well for most objectives, but not for one species-type (arboreal mammal) and water-quality. While MCDA made this conflict explicit, resolution of the problem depended on the weighting assigned to each objective. Additive weighting of criteria sacrificed the arboreal mammal and water quality for gains in other objectives. Multiplicative weighting identified scenarios that avoided poor outcomes for any objective; important for avoiding potentially irreversible biodiversity losses. To distinguish reliably among management options, future work should focus on reducing uncertainty in outcomes across a range of objectives. Considering management actions that have more predictable outcomes than landscape fuel management will be important. Our study demonstrates that, where data are adequate, MCDA can support decision-making in the complex and often conflicted area of fire management. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Language: en