{"id":14431,"date":"2021-02-05T13:00:28","date_gmt":"2021-02-05T21:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/calcanstaging.kinsta.cloud\/?p=14431"},"modified":"2021-02-05T12:46:15","modified_gmt":"2021-02-05T20:46:15","slug":"wildfire-solutions-for-agriculture-part-1-controlled-burns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calclimateag.org\/es\/wildfire-solutions-for-agriculture-part-1-controlled-burns\/","title":{"rendered":"Wildfire Solutions for Agriculture, Part 1: Controlled Burns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Note: This is the first blog in a 4-part series on solutions to address the impacts of <\/em>wildfire on agricultural communities. <\/em><\/p>\n

The Context: Wildfires\u2019 Growing Impacts<\/strong><\/p>\n

The frequency and severity of catastrophic wildfires are increasing in California for a combination of reasons, including: climate change, a century of fire suppression, past logging practices, the dislocation of indigenous peoples and their longstanding cultural fire practices, increased human-caused ignitions, and increased development in high fire-risk areas.<\/p>\n

Wildfires have a range of impacts on the state\u2019s agricultural communities. These include exposure to toxic air pollution, direct fire damage to farms and ranches, smoke damage to crops, forced evacuations, increased insurance premiums in rural areas, post-fire soil erosion, and negative impacts to water quality.<\/p>\n

One recent University of California study<\/a> estimates the total economic impact of the 2018 fires alone was $149 billion \u2013 equivalent to roughly two-thirds of the state\u2019s pre-pandemic budget. Wildfires also contribute high levels of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to the atmosphere. The California Air Resources Board estimates the 2020 wildfires<\/a> alone released 112 million metric tons of carbon dioxide (Figure E-1), which is equivalent to roughly one-fourth of the state\u2019s total GHG emissions in 2018<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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A problem of this scale and complexity requires urgent action and multiple solutions. One of those solutions is controlled burns, which are sometimes referred to as prescribed fire\/burns or cultural fire\/burns in the context of indigenous land stewardship.<\/p>\n

One Solution: Controlled Burns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Controlled burns consist of low-intensity fires that are intentionally lit in ideal weather conditions to treat a specified area to achieve specific objectives (e.g. reduce fine or ladder fuels, enhance native species, and\/or manage invasive species). While these controlled burns can create short-term smoke impacts, they often mitigate the risk of larger, catastrophic fires which cause significantly higher air pollution, ecological, and economic impacts.<\/p>\n

Many tribes in California have used controlled burns to steward fire-adapted landscapes and protect their communities for thousands of years. In Tending the Wild: Native American Knowledge and the Management of California\u2019s Natural Resources<\/a><\/em>, USDA-NRCS ethnoecologist M. Kat Anderson writes: \u201cFire was the most significant, effective, efficient, and widely employed vegetation management tool of California Indian tribes…the fire scientists Robert Martin and David Sapsis estimate that between 5.6 million and 13 million acres of California burned annually under both lightning and indigenous people\u2019s fire regimes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bill Tripp, the Director of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy with the Karuk Tribe\u2019s Department of Natural Resources<\/a>, said in a hearing last fall<\/a> that revitalizing a cultural relationship to fire is key:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>\u201cOur relationship with fire is one that is supposed to be natural to place. Revitalizing our human-fire relationships is paramount to the preservation of our cultural identity. This is why we separate prescribed fire from cultural burning in the discussion. We can prescribe all the fire we want, and we can use it as a great shared stewardship and shared learning tool; but until our relationship with fire resumes its place as a cultural process that aligns with indigenous socio-ecological functions relevant to our homelands, we will not even begin to address the impacts of an era of fire exclusion coupled with climate impacts.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Dr. Crystal Kolden,<\/a> a Professor of Fire Science at UC Merced, wrote in the journal Fire<\/em><\/a> in 2019: \u201c<\/em>The scientific literature has repeatedly reported that prescribed fire is often the most effective means of achieving such goals by reducing fuels and wildfire hazard and restoring ecological function to fire-adapted ecosystems in the United States following a century of fire exclusion.\u201d Despite the scientific consensus and economic case for controlled burns, Dr. Kolden\u2019s research found that the amount of acreage that has been subject to controlled burns has remained stable or actually decreased in the past two decades. This \u201cfire deficit\u201d is the result of many factors, including a number of challenges we summarize below.<\/p>\n

To address the state\u2019s fire deficit, CalFIRE\u2019s latest Forest Carbon Plan<\/a> sets a target of implementing approximately 500,000 acres of vegetation treatment, which includes both thinning and controlled burns in non-federal<\/em> forests, woodlands, and chaparral ecosystem per year. To achieve those targets, individual land owners, tribes, businesses and nonprofits \u2013 which collectively own approximately 40 percent of the state\u2019s forests and a sizeable share of the state\u2019s grasslands \u2013 will all need to play a role.<\/p>\n

Several tribes are actively seeking partnerships with government agencies that respect their sovereignty and enable them to re-introduce controlled burns to the landscape.<\/p>\n

Many farmers and ranchers, tribes, and fire and rangeland experts have also recently organized themselves into Prescribed Burn Associations<\/a> (PBAs), which UCCE Fire Advisor Lenya Quinn-Davidson describes as \u201ccommunity cooperatives for prescribed fire.\u201d To further facilitate the implementation of controlled burns, the state will certify its first class of \u201cburn bosses\u201d in 2021, thanks to a program established by SB 1260<\/a> (Jackson) in 2018.<\/p>\n

Challenges to Scaling Up \u201cGood Fire\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

With all of this growing interest in controlled burns, what is stopping California from scaling up this practice?<\/p>\n

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  1. Liability concerns and lack of prescribed fire insurance<\/strong>: California is a \u201csimple negligence\u201d state, which means that the landowner can be held legally responsible for property damage, suppression costs, and the cost of investigations and reports if a prescribed burn escapes its planned area and \u201creasonable care\u201d was not taken. This liability standard, plus the inexistence of prescribed fire insurance in the state, together act as considerable disincentives for private landowners to implement controlled burns. The certified burn boss program is intended to address these concerns, but the experts we interviewed are concerned there will not be enough incentive for people to enroll in the burn boss program. For example, certified burn bosses will not be able to obtain prescribed fire insurance or enjoy a different liability standard. In comparison, other states such as Florida, Washington, and Colorado offer certified burn bosses the benefit of gross negligence standards. For more on prescribed fire liability issues, see \u201cPrescribed Fire Liability in California<\/a>\u201d by UCCE Advisors Lenya Quinn-Davidson and Jeffery Stackhouse.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
      \n
    1. Permitting costs and delays: <\/strong>Obtaining permits from Air Quality Management Districts (AQMDs) for smoke management plans often takes weeks or months, forcing ranchers and tribes to miss limited \u201cburn windows.\u201d In some counties, the cost of permits from AQMDs is simply cost-prohibitive. This is especially vexing for tribes seeking to do burns on their own sovereign land. If the prescribed fire project is state-funded, it has historically been required to go through the CEQA process, which almost always ends up costing more than the actual implementation.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
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      1. Fear of fire and smoke, and limited resources for outreach, training, and coordination<\/strong>: For the past half century, fire management has been largely relegated to government agencies. Margo Robbins, Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Cultural Fire Management Council<\/a> and a Member of the Yurok Tribe, says that \u201cFire must be returned to the hands of the people,\u201d and that we must \u201cwork together to build a culture of fire that is inclusive of all ethnicities and socioeconomic backgrounds.\u201d Fears of fire and intolerance of smoke also hinders progress. To adequately respond to the wildfire crisis, we must see fire as a natural part of our ecosystem and a tool for stewardship, and smoke as something we manage rather than eliminate. As Margo Robbins put it: \u201cThere is no such thing as a no-smoke option. We will have either limited amounts of wood smoke from prescribed burns or massive amounts toxic smoke from wildfires. People must choose their smoke.\u201d Currently, there are only a handful of extension-focused UCCE Fire Advisors in the state<\/a>, who play a critical role in advancing our scientific understanding of fire in specific regions, educating the public about fire, and training land owners and managers in science-based, ecological fire mitigation practices. Regional planning and coordination for scaling up controlled burns and sustaining long-term vegetation management is also lacking.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        Policy Solutions to Scaling Up Controlled Burns<\/strong><\/p>\n

        \u00a0<\/strong>This fall, we interviewed fire experts and practitioners, including ranchers.\u00a0 Based on those interviews, the following policy recommendations can further scale up controlled burns in safe and sustainable ways:<\/p>\n