Citation

Nowell HK, Holmes CD, Robertson K, Teske C, Hiers JK. Geophys. Res. Lett. 2018; 45(15): 7874-7884.

Affiliation

Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy Tallahassee FL Florida.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, American Geophysical Union)

DOI

10.1029/2018GL078679

PMID

31031448

PMCID

PMC6474124

Abstract

Florida, United States, government records provide a new resource for studying fire in landscapes managed with prescribed fire. In Florida, most fire area (92%) is prescribed. Current satellite fire products, which underpin most air pollution emission inventories, detect only 25% of burned area, which alters airborne emissions and environmental impacts. Moreover, these satellite products can misdiagnose spatiotemporal variability of fires. Overall fire area in Florida decreases during drought conditions as prescribed fires are avoided, but satellite data do not reflect this pattern. This pattern is consistent with prescribed fire successfully reducing overall fire risk and damages. Human management of prescribed fires and fuels can, therefore, break the conventional link between drought and wildfire and play an important role in mitigating rising fire risk in a changing climate. These results likely apply in other regions of the world with similar fire regimes.

Language: en

Keywords

biomass burning; climate; prescribed fire; remote sensing; wildfire