Viewpoint: Delusional to think we can control nature
George Wuerthner
The House recently passed the Fix Our Forests legislation. The legislation seeks to increase fuel reductions on public lands through logging and prescribed burns.
However, large wildfires are ultimately not controlled by fuels. Fires need fuel to ignite, but they often start in dense timber or during the time of year when fuel is moist.
Climate/weather are the main controlling factors in all large wildfires. You need drought, high temperatures, low humidity, and, most importantly, high winds for an ignition to proliferate into an inferno. The wind is the main factor that causes small blazes to blow up into massive, rapidly moving wildfires.
The majority of all wildfires never grow beyond a few hundred acres. It is only a small percentage when extreme fire weather conditions grow into monster conflagrations. However, under these “red flag” conditions, wildfires overwhelm firefighting capabilities and fuel reduction strategies.
There are several problems with logging and prescribed burns as a fire control plan. First, few wildfires encounter these fuel reductions when they may be effective. Some suggest that less than !% of all fires run into a fuel reduction. So, most logging/thinning and prescribed burns do not influence wildfire spread.
However, fuel reductions are not harmless. Logging removes carbon from the forest and releases it into the atmosphere, contributing to Green greenhouse gases that are a major factor in climate change.
Logging removes wood from the forest ecosystem. In particular, dead trees are critical habitat for many wildlife species.
Evidence shows that frequent logging enhances fire spread by opening up the forest floor to more sun and reducing soil moisture. Thinned forests also allow wind to penetrate, exacerbating fire spread and throwing embers far beyond the fire front.
The focus of public policies on logging and prescribed burns minimally impact the conditions causing large-scale fires. Fuel reductions do not mitigate drought or halt strong winds.
The recent LA fires with 100 mph winds is a good example of how ineffective all fuel reduction efforts are at precluding large fires. The LA fires threw embers miles ahead of the firefront, crossing over 10-lane freeways, large parking lots, and numerous other areas that were completely barren of any fuels.
Another fact ignored by the Fix Our Forests legislation is that most charred acreage occurs in grasslands or shrublands, not forests. The LA fires burned almost exclusively through chaparral.
Fuel reductions are ultimately ineffective. They give the impression that humans can control natural processes like wildfire. However, as climate change exacerbates the conditions that create large, high-severity blazes, we need a new paradigm that seeks to reduce human vulnerability to such blazes.
Zoning that prevents home construction in regions with high fire potential and working from the home outward to reduce the flammability of structures should be the focus of public policy.
Fuel reduction should focus on the area directly around communities or homes. And it must be repeated frequently to have any influence whatsoever.
We need to abandon the idea that we can control Nature. The old adage that “Nature Bats Last” still applies, and we would be remiss if we ignore it.