What is California doing to prevent the next major wildfire?

By Stephen Starr

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With suburban communities and the wilderness increasingly entwined as San Diego’s population expands ever deeper into the eastern hills, efforts to counter the fire threat have fuelled much experimentation and investigation.

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“Integrating private-land conservation decision-making with wildfire risk reduction is potentially a new and innovative approach to more cost-effective conservation planning,” the resulting research, published in Landscape and Urban Planning in 2017, found. “Typically, what we’ve seen is that areas with homes closer together are less likely to burn,” says Prof Van Butsic, a co-author of the report.

However, the modelling also found that inexpensive land parcels, the very property that municipalities and conservationist land trusts can afford to buy, are often found where the threat of fire is low. Above all, the modelling found that purchasing land with the goal of putting as much distance as possible between people and the flames needs to be highly strategic.

Mature trees

For many Californians, their concerns lie elsewhere. For the wealthy, the demand for large residential lots adorned with mature trees and other easy-burning foliage remains as strong as ever. For others, the cost of everyday life means that conservation is often little more than a passing concern. In January, Californians were angered by proposals from utility provider Pacific Gas and Electric Company to introduce a $10 monthly rate hike to help it pay for improved wildfire monitoring systems. By January 29th, however, the company had declared bankruptcy and now faces a pending legal maelstrom associated with November’s wildfires in Paradise and Malibu.

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