1 / 9

The Economics Implications of Fuel Management: Sagebrush Rangelands

The Economics Implications of Fuel Management: Sagebrush Rangelands. Presenter: Laine Christman (UNR) For the Eastern Nevada Landscape Coalition and Nevada Pinyon -Juniper Joint Summer Conference July 16 th , 2014. Authors: Michael Taylor, Kimberly Rollins, Mimako Kobayashi, Robin Tausch.

hawa
Download Presentation

The Economics Implications of Fuel Management: Sagebrush Rangelands

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. The Economics Implications of Fuel Management: Sagebrush Rangelands Presenter: Laine Christman (UNR) For the Eastern Nevada Landscape Coalition and Nevada Pinyon-Juniper Joint Summer Conference July 16th, 2014 Authors: Michael Taylor, Kimberly Rollins, Mimako Kobayashi, Robin Tausch

  2. Why the Great Basin? • Suffering from invasive grass and PJ encroachment • Wildfire contributes to these threats • Ecosystem changes effects costs of fighting fire, habitat, ranching, recreation values, etc. • Treatments to reduce threats • Reduce fuel loading/characteristics – lessen wildfire severity • Restore health and resiliency of the ecosystem • What is the value of these treatments? • One approach – put benefits in terms of reduced future wildfire suppression costs Introduction and Study Area Mountain Big Wyoming

  3. Inputs • Treatment cost (per acre) and probability of success • FRI and cost of wildfire (per acre) • Transition time between ecologic health states • Assume a finite number of year without wildfire or treatment • Assume fire in “healthy state” is , fire in “unhealthy state” is  • Simulation Based – dynamic • Changes happen over time • Uncertainty regarding state, success, fire • Defined States of Health • Mountain Big Sagebrush • Healthy = Shrubs/ native grass or mix PJ/shrubs/ native grass • Unhealthy = Closed Canopy PJ or invasive grass dominated • Wyoming Sagebrush Steppe • Healthy = Shrubs/grass • Unhealthy = Decadent sagebrush/grass or invasive grass dominated The Model

  4. Big Mountain Sagebrush (>6500 ft) STM

  5. Wyoming Sagebrush Steppe (4700-6500 ft) STM

  6. WSS-1 • Benefit = $272/acre (CBR = 13.3) • Tx Cost - $19.50/acres and highly successful are preventing transition • Expected wildfire cost savings = $293/acre • WSS-2 • Treatment is expensive ($205/acre) • only successful half the time • Failure moves to WSS-3 • WSS-3 • reduces wildfire suppression costs • Treatment is extremely expensive • Rarely successful Results - WSS

  7. MBS-1 & MBS-2 • Only BCR greater than 1 • Cheap, successful, prevent transition • MBS-3& MBS-4 • Expensive, unsuccessful • Not a good return on investment Result Table - MBS

  8. Take Home Message • Fuel treatment are cost effective for healthiest states only • Treatment costs are relatively cheap and success is relatively high • Results hold for a range of different success rates • Fuel treatment costs greater than expected wildfire costs for unhealthiest states • Once degraded, benefits reduce dramatically • Rehabilitation costs are expensive and success is relative low • Fuel Treatment Priority for a uniform landscape • Focus on lands that have not yet transitioned • WSS-1 = 13.3 • MBS-1b CBR = 9.0 • MBS-1a CBR = 5.7 Results and Conclusion

  9. Thank You

More Related