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News from Fire Research: Estimation of Future Forest Fire Development in the State of Brandenburg (IFFN No. 21 – September 1999)

NEWS FROM FIRE RESEARCH:

Estimation of Future Forest Fire Development in the State of Brandenburg

(IFFN No. 21 – September 1999,p. 91-93)

Background and Challenge

The state of Brandenburg is the region in Germany that is most strongly exposed to forest fires. From 1991 to 1995, there were on average 6 fires per 10,000 ha (average in Germany: 1.8 fires per 10,000 ha). Since the occurrence of forest fires is strongly influenced by climate, the question arises how the risk of forest fires will develop under changing climate conditions.

Fig.1. Number of forest fires in the state of Brandenburg 1975 – 1995

Approach

The future climate development is estimated by means of regional scenario models that consider large-scale climate tendencies as well as locally observed meteorological values. The development of climate and forest fires are connected by an index that is based on climate parameters. The calculation of this forest fire index (FFI) is based on temperature and precipitation conditions during the vegetation period:

sd = 1 if the daily maximum of air temperature > 25.0°C 0     in all other cases p = daily sum of precipitation vb = beginning of vegetation period (April 1st) ve = end of vegetation period (September 30th)

Results

Calculation of the average number of forest fires in nine almost equally sized regions of Brandenburg as of 2050 with an assumed temperature increase by 1.5(C. The moderate temperate increase is connected with a decrease of the annual sum of precipitation by 50-100 mm (Fig.2a and b). As a consequence, an increase of the average number of annual forest fires in the whole state from 512 to 605 forest fires is to be expected. This increase varies between 5 and 30 in the different regions (Fig.2c and d).

Fig.2a. Mean annual sum of precipitation 19511990

Fig.2b. Mean annual sum of precipitation as of 2050 based on scenario calculations

Fig.2c. Mean regional number of forest fires 1975 1995

Fig.2d. Mean regional increase of annual forest fires as of 2050 based on scenario calculations

Conclusions

Climate changes can lead to a distinct increasing risk of forest fires in the state of Brandenburg. With the climate scenario model used, climate changes will be calculated for different regions. Based on this, climate impacts can now be better estimated than before. The results are valuable as a basis for decision-making in forest management. For example, adaptive forest management strategies aiming at a modified species composition could help to reduce the susceptibility of forest stands to forest fires.

F.-W. Gerstengarbe, P.C. Werner, M. Lindner, G. Bruschek
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
Telegrafenberg C4
14473 Potsdam
Germany

Phone: +49-331-288-2500
Fax:     +49-331-288-2600
e-mail:     info@potsdam.de
Web site: http://www.pik-potsdam.de

IFFN No. 21

24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin

News from Fire Reseach: The Global Fire Product: Fire Distribution from Satellite Data (IFFN No. 19 – September 1998)

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NEWS FROM FIRE RESEARCH:

The Global Fire Product:
Fire Distribution from Satellite Data

(IFFN No. 19 – September 1998,p. 78-83)

Introduction

In 1991, following a workshop on the requirements for terrestrial biospheric data sets and in response to requirements from the International Geosphere Biosphere Programme (IGBP) core projects, IGBP-DIS set up the Fire Working Group (FWG) to develop a consensus algorithm for global fire mapping. From this was born the concept of a Global Fire Product (GFP). This would be based on the use of an active fire detection algorithm and the global daily Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) data being collected by the IGBP-DIS 1 km AVHRR Global Land Project (Eidenshink and Faundeen 1994). A consensus algorithm was developed (Flasse and Ceccato 1996) and approved by the FWG in 1996 (Malingreau and Justice 1996). Data processing was initiated at the Joint Research Centre (JRC) in 1996, and completed in November 1997 (Stroppiana et al. 1998).

Input data set

The input data set is composed of 5-channel, raw AVHRR scenes at 1.1 km (nadir) resolution for each daily afternoon orbital pass of NOAA-11 over all land and coastal zones. The data were collected over the 21 month period from April 1992 to December 1993. The data set was provided by the USGS-EROS Data Center and ESA-ESRIN; it is fully documented in Eidenshink and Faudeen (1994).

Algorithm

Each region of the globe has its own characteristic fire regime, biome, and seasonal pattern of surface temperature and consequently, a different response in each of the NOAA-AVHRR channels as a result of fire disturbance. In order to process a global data set automatically and without adjusting the algorithm for each geographic region a contextual algorithm was chosen since it gives better performance and global consistency compared to a conventional channel-threshold technique (Giglio et al. 1998). The chosen algorithm is essentially that of Flasse and Ceccato (1996), with very minor modifications. For each day processed, the system ingests 2 gigabytes of data from tape, which represents the 5 channels of the raw AVHRR data for the 14 orbits covering all land areas of the globe. Firstly the data is geolocated using an orbit model obtained from the Colorado Center for Astrodynamics Research (CCAR) (Rosborough et al. 1994). The orbit model is typically accurate to ±2 pixels. Then all ocean and large inland water bodies are masked out. A “no-burn” mask is applied to exclude regions where the surface is of a type which does not support any significant biomass burning. These masks significantly reduce the amount of data to be subsequently processed. A simple cloud detection algorithm based on that of Saunders and Kriebel (1988) is applied before finally testing the remaining pixels for the presence of hot sources using the algorithm mentioned above.

Product description

The GFP itself is composed of the following two kinds of data:

Daily fire position tables: These consist of daily lists of the latitude and longitude of each fire pixel detected by the system for the period April 1992 December 1993.

10-day synthesis raster format data: These are 10-day composite rasters on latitude-longitude grids of 0.5º ´ 0.5º cells and contain the following bands:

Fire Density Map: The number of fire pixels detected in each grid cell (see Fig.1)

Cloud/No-Data Map: The percentage of cloud or “no-data” obscuring each cell, and

No-Burn Mask: The percentage of each grid cell masked out by the no-burn mask.

Global distribution of fire activity

Twelve months of the global fire product (April 1992 March 1993) have been studied in detail and the spatial and temporal distribution of fires has been reported elsewhere (Dwyer et al. 1998a,b). A total of 6.5 million fire pixels were detected in the 12 months of 1 km resolution AVHRR data analyzed. However, these are not evenly distributed throughout the year (Fig.2). There is a peak in global fire activity in July and August. It then decreases slowly reaching a minimum in early November when the number detected is only 28% of those detected during the period of peak burning. From November fire activity increases again reaching another lower peak in late December and January after which activity reduces.

While over 70% of fire pixels are located within the tropics, 50% of all fire pixels detected were on the African continent. Most of the fires are set in the savanna regions. The reasons for burning are numerous and vary across the continent, but some of the more common ones are: burning to remove unpalatable stubble and to initiate off-season regrowth of fresh shoots, clearing ground for crops, establishment of fire-breaks around settlements, removal of parasites, to drive game out of hiding and to make pathways accessible. Other regions where very high concentrations of fire activity were seen are in mainland Southeast Asia, the Orissa province in Eastern India, parts of the Cerrado in Brazil and Arnhem land in the Northern Territories of Australia. Although the number of fires occurring in temperate and boreal biomes is much smaller than in the tropics, they can have a big impact on land cover and the global carbon cycle. Fires in boreal biomes can be of extremely large extent, consume very high fuel quantities and are often left to burn out naturally.

Uses of the product

The use of the Global Fire Product (GFP) was envisaged for two user communities which can be loosely collected under the subject areas of atmospheric chemistry and ecosystem studies. Biomass burning is responsible for large emissions of gaseous and particulate products into the atmosphere and has a significant role in ecosystem maintenance and change. Use of the data is foreseen in certain IGBP core projects such as the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry project (IGAC), the Land-Use and Land-Cover Change Project (LUCC) and the Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystems project (GCTE) . Other international initiatives such as the Global Observation of Forest Cover (GOFC) project of CEOS and Forest Resources Assessment (FRA) 2000 (FAO) have expressed interest in utilizing the product. The product is unique in that a single algorithm was used for all the processing therefore guaranteeing an internally consistent data set. The full resolution of 1km is available to all users who may regrid the data for their own requirements. This flexibility allows the use of the product across a wide range of spatial scales.

Atmospheric Chemistry Studies

The highest resolution of the GFP is 1 km. In studies related to atmospheric chemistry, it is probable that a gridded product at a lower resolution is more appropriate. Figure 1 shows fire counts in 0.5° by 0.5° grid cells for a ten day period. Similar products of different grid sizes and over different time durations can easily be constructed from the basic product. The information provided by the GFP which can be of most use to the atmospheric chemistry community is:

Spatial localisation of fire events

Spatial variation in the number of fire events

Seasonality of fire.

With respect to the last point, although the day on which each fire event was detected is recorded, the seasonality i.e. the time period and duration of the burning season is likely to be of more interest. Figure 3 shows an example of such a derived product. The mid fire season month which is defined as the month in which 50% of all fire events were recorded for each grid cell is shown. Other parameters related to the seasonality of burning can be easily derived. Previous studies of emissions due to biomass burning have generally assigned an empirical time distribution of burning events throughout the fire season and across large areas. Hao and Liu (1994) and Kim and Newchurch (1998) used ozone measurements to identify the spatial location and burning period in their studies of gaseous emissions and transport from biomass burning. The GFP can give improved estimates of these parameters from direct observations.

Fig.1. Summary of fire pixels per cell from 30 July to 8 August 1992.

Fig.2. The number of fire pixels detected in each of the 12 months of AVHRR data.

It is not advised to use the GFP to estimate area burned as the product indicates only the presence or absence of fire in a pixel. Nor can it be used to count the absolute number of fire events in a given location as it is only a temporal sample. Although a research study using 1 km AVHRR data combined with high resolution LANDSAT data in Southern Africa has shown that it is feasible to estimate burned area from the 1 km data (Justice et al., 1996), its results cannot be universally applied. Extensive research for different vegetation types would need to be carried out if such a scheme were to be adopted. Current research is focused on retrieving burned area directly from low resolution satellite data.

Ecosystem Studies

Vegetation types affected: The GFP facilitates the study of fire in relation to landcover and ecosystem dynamics. The relative levels of fire occurrence in different vegetation types and regions can be estimated when the data is used with appropriate land cover maps. Using the 25 class United States Geological Survey (USGS) legend supplied with the IGBP-DIS 1km land cover map, fire distributions were determined for the different vegetation types. Almost 90% of all the fire pixels detected were found in 8 vegetation types. Table 1 shows the percentage of the global land surface covered by each of these vegetation types, the proportion of each type which was affected by fire and the percentage of the earths land surface this represents. Although over 6% of the earths surface was affected by fire in the course of the year, this does not mean that this much surface area was burned. As each fire pixel detected covers a 1 km2 surface area it can represent one or more fires of unknown dimensions within that area. The type of vegetation burned is also of interest in atmospheric chemistry studies and in research into carbon cycling.

Timing The timing of fire is a very important parameter in relation to the study of fire impact on ecosystems. In tropical regions, late dry season fires are generally more intense and difficult to control than those occurring in the early dry season, when the fuel is more moist. The GFP data combined with data on vegetation conditions or weather data for the year in question can be used to determine how the timing of burning varies spatially and in different vegetation types.

Fig.3. For each 0.5° by 0.5° cell the month of the mid fire season is shown. This is independent of the number of fire pixels detected in a cell (330 KB)

Tab.1. Vegetation types affected by fire. The eight vegetation types, as defined in the IGBP-DIS land cover map, which showed the most fire activity account for 66% of the earths land surface. Varying amounts of each vegetation type were affected by fire, however, savanna burning was the most widespread.

Vegetation Type

% of global land surface

% of vegetation type affected

% of global land surface affected by fire

Savanna

11

19

2.1

Evergreen Broadleaf forest

10

7

0.7

Deciduous Broadleaf forest

5

13

0.6

Dryland crops and pasture

9

6

0.5

Shrubland

12

4

0.5

Cropland/Woodland mosaic

7

7

0.5

Irrigated Crops and pasture

3

14

0.4

Grassland

9

4

0.3

Land use and Land Cover Change Fire is an indicator of land use and land cover conversion. Although the GFP is limited in time to 21 months, because of its global extent which covers all ecosystems it facilitates the study of spatial relationships between fire activity and land cover use and change.

Diurnal Cycle The GFP gives a snapshot of fire activity for each location at one instant – early afternoon- during the day. It is not a record of total fire activity. Until further information is available on the diurnal variation in burning in different regions and vegetation types, it is not possible to say what percentage of vegetation fires are captured in the GFP. Night time data from the Defence Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP), and the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) combined with the GFP can improve knowledge of the diurnal cycle in burning.

Limitations of the product

The GFP is the first map of global vegetation fire derived with a single algorithm directly from observations of the fires themselves, and it will undoubtedly prove to be of considerable value both in global and regional scale studies. The contextual algorithm gives better fire detection performance over that obtained with algorithms based on simple threshold tests and it provides the best consistency for global applications (Giglio et al. 1998). However there are a number of limitations to fire detection using the AVHRR sensor alone. The imagery only represents a snapshot of the total number of fires which burn in any 24 hour period, fire counts may be either overestimated or underestimated due to confusion with hot surfaces and sun glint from reflective surfaces such as water and clouds. Although flaming fires with fronts as short as 50 m can be detected, in general no information on the fire characteristics (e.g. size, temperature) is available. However, this single observation system approach will soon be qualitatively and quantitatively improved by combining global datasets of both active fires and burned areas from different Earth observing systems.

Product availability

In March 1998 the Fire Working Group (FWG) of the IGBP-DIS recommended an internal evaluation process to be completed by the end of the year before adoption of the GFP as an IGBP-DIS data set. The GFP has been distributed to the FWG and users involved in biomass burning research. During this time, the quality of GFP will be assessed in each of the major biomes. The results of the evaluation will be available with the product. In the meantime, the data set is available for use on application to the authors.

Acknowledgments

The Global Fire Project was conducted under the direction of Jean-Paul Malingreau, and was coordinated by the Fire Working Group of IGBP-DIS. This work was funded by the European Commission.

Edward Dwyer, Daniela Stroppiana, Simon Pinnock, and Jean-Marie Grégoire @
Global Vegetation Monitoring (GVM) Unit, Space Applications Institute, Joint Research Centre, European Commission, Ispra, Italy. Corresponding author:

Edward Dwyer
MTV/SAI, TP263
Joint Research Centre
I – 21020 Ispra, Varese, ITALY

Fax: ++39-0332-789073
Tel: ++39-0332-785608
e-mail: ned.dwyer@jrc.it

References

Dwyer, E., J.-M.Grégoire, and J.P.Malingreau. 1998a. A global analysis of vegetation fires using satellite images: spatial and temporal dynamics. Ambio 27 (3), 175-181.

Dwyer, E., S.Pinnock, J.-M.Grégoire, and J.M.C.Pereira. 1998b. Global spatial and temporal distribution of vegetation fire as determined from satellite observations International Journal of Remote Sensing (submitted)

Eidenshink, J.C., and J.L.Faudeen. 1994. The 1-km AVHRR fire detection. Int. J. Remote Sensing, 15, 3443- 3462.

Flasse, S., and P. Ceccato. 1996. A contextual Algorithm for AVHRR fire detection. Int. J. Remote Sensing, 17, 419-424.

Giglio, L., J.D.Kendall, and C.O.Justice. 1998. Evaluation of Global Fire Detection Algorithm Using Simulated AVHRR Infrared Data. Int. J. Remote Sensing (accepted).

Hao, W.M., and M.H.Liu. 1994. Spatial and temporal distribution of tropical biomass burning. Global Biogeochemical Cycles 8, 495-503.

Justice, C.O., J.D.Kendall, P.R.Dowty, and R.J.Scholes. 1996. Satellite remote sensing of fires during the SAFARI campaign using NOAA advanced very high resolution radiometer data. J. Geophys. Res. 101 (D19), 23851-23863.

Kim, J.H., and M.J.Newchurch. 1998 Biomass-burning influence on tropospheric ozone over New Guinea and South America. J. Geophys. Res. 103 (D1), 1455-1461.

Malingreau, J.P., and C.O.Justice. 1996. Definition and implementation of a global fire product derived from AVHRR data. IGBP-DIS Working Paper #17, 3rd IGBP-DIS Fire Working Group meeting report, Toulouse, France, on 13-15 November 1996.

Rosborough, G., Baldwin, D., and Emery, W.J., 1994, Precise AVHRR image navigation. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing 32, 644-657.

Saunders, R.W., and Kriebel, K.T., 1988, An improved method for detecting clear sky and cloud radiances from AVHRR data. Int. J. Remote Sensing 9, 123-150.Stroppiana, D., S.Pinnock, and J.M.Grégoire. 1998. The global fire product. Int. J. Remote Sensing (submitted)

IFFN No. 19

24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin

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Fig.3. For each 0.5° by 0.5° cell the month of the mid fire season is shown. This is independent of the number of fire pixels detected in a cell

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24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin

News from Fire Research: IGBP/IGAC: BIBEX Steering Commiteee Meeting (IFFN No. 19 – September 1998)

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NEWS FROM FIRE RESEARCH:

IGBP/IGAC
BIBEX Steering Commiteee Meeting

(IFFN No. 19 – September 1998,p. 84-87)

Between 19 and 25 August 1998 an International Symposium on Global Atmospheric Chemistry was held in Seattle (USA), jointly organized by the IAMAS Commission on Atmospheric Chemistry and Global Pollution (CACGP) and the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry Project (IGAC), a core project of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP). One of the activities of the IGAC Focus 2 (“Natural Variability and Anthropgenic Perturbations of the Tropical Atmospheric Chemistry”) is Biomass Burnig Experiment (BIBEX) which is co-sponsor of International Forest Fire News.

The Joint Symposium provided the platform for several sessions on “Human Impacts” in which a series of papers and posters were presented on the effect of vegetation burning on the regional and global atmosphere. The symposium provided the opportunity for a BIBEX Steering Committee meeting which was held on 22 August 1998 at the conference site on the campus of the University of Washington, Seattle.

Minutes of the BIBEX Steering Committee Meeting

After the opening of the meeting by M.O.Andreae, convener of BIBEX, steering committee members and guests reported about the state of fire and fire-related research campaigns:

The Large Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia (LBA-CLAIRE)

M.O.Andreae reported the first results of CLAIRE, the 1998 campaign of the Cooperative LBA Airborne Regional Experiment (LBA = Large Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia; see IFFN August 1996, pp. 53-54 and http://yabae.cptec.inpe.br/lba/) which was conducted in March-April 1998. CLAIRE aims to develop an integrated and quantitative understanding of the interactions of biogenic source fluxes, atmospheric transport and vertical exchange, and photochemical processing over the tropical forest. LBA/CLAIRE is a biogenic/biospheric experiment with a fire research component in which the influence of extra-regional fire emissions imported into the study area is investigated. For more details on the fire component: See contribution by Grégoire et al. in this volume. The CLAIRE website is http://www.mpch-mainz.mpg.de/CLAIRE.htm.

The International Crown Fire Modelling Experiment

B.J.Stocks reported about the 1998 field phase of the International Crwon Fire Modeling Experiment which was implemented in June/July 1998 (for an introduction: see IFFN August 1996, pp.54-58; for details See <http://www.nofc.forestry.ca/fire/fmn/nwt>.

The African Fire-Atmosphere Research Initiative (AFARI-97)

J.G.Goldammer and B.J.Stocks reported about the field implementation of the campaign which aimed to investigate the the ecological and atmospheric chemical impacts of fire in the East African grasslands which – in contrast to the Southern African savannas – are fertile and rich in protein (nitrogen) content. AFARI-97 was conducted in two sites in Kenya in late September and early October 1997 (Lewa Downs Ranch in the Isiolo district immediately north of Mount Kenya and Hopcraft Ranch on the Athi Kapiti Plains 40 km south of Nairobi). The size of experimental burns ranged between 50-200 hectares. Ground measurements included standard botanical and fuel inventories (before and after the burns), fire behaviour, and meteorological data. The airborne component concentrated on aerosol sampling. Most of the experimental burns were coordinated with satellite measurements for validation purposes. The fires were described in detail on the ground and from small aircraft during the overpass of the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) on the NOAA weather satellite (see IFFN January 1998, pp.91-92). In the BIBEX discussion R.Swap recommended coordination of AFARAI-97 follow-up with the Miombo network.

The Zambian International Biomass Burning Emissions Experiment (ZIBBEE)

D.Ward reported on the still ongoing (1997-98) research campaign in Zambia. The ZIBBEE experiment was organized in cooperation with the US Forest Service Fire Chemistry Laboratory, the Zambian Meteorology Department and NASA’s AERONET and EOS-DIS program with the primary objectives to quantify the aerosol and trace gas fluxes from the Miombo woodlands of southern Africa. Embedded within this study are objectives to quantify the consumption of biomass (carbon) from biomass burning, validation of aerosol retrievals from various satellite sensors, and direct radiative forcing by biomass burning aerosols (see IFFN January 1998, pp.92-93). Contact: Darold Ward pyroward@aol.com.

FROSTFIRE

B.J.Stocks reports about FROSTFIRE. Co-sponsored by the IBFRA Fire Working Group, this experiment will involve conducting a high-intensity 700 hectare prescribed fire on a catchment of the Caribou-Poker Creek Experimental Watershed just north of Fairbanks, Alaska. This catchment consists of steep north-facing slopes dominated by Picea underlain by permafrost, and steep south-facing slopes where Betula predominates. Hydrological measurements have been conducted at this site for decades, and will be continued after the fire as part of a suite of fire impact studies which will include detailed fire ecology and effects investigations. Thorough fuels and fire behaviour documentation will permit linkages between fire behaviour (fuel consumption/intensity) and postfire impacts. This will be a long-term study, closely linked with the Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) Program in the United States. The burn had been scheduled for summer 1998 but had to be postponed to 1999 due to unfavourable weather conditions. For more information:

http://www.lter.alaska.edu/cgi-bin/w3-msql/jirons/ffprojects.html

SEAFIRE and related expeeriments in SE Asia

J.G.Goldammer reports about the South East Asian Fire Experiment (SEAFIRE) which has not yet materialized in a larger coordinated fire research campaign. SEAFIRE is rather aiming to provide a networking platform for ground and airborne fire research in the region. SEAFIRE has supported the government of Indonesia in establishing the Indonesian Research Institute for Climate, Environment and Society (INRICES) which was founded during the peak of the SE Asian smoke episode in November 1997. In the context of SEAFIRE a series of projects in remote sensing and ground truthing of fire and fire impacts are being conducted (see various contributions in this issue of IFFN). It is currently envisaged to propose a small research program under the the Asia-Pacific Network (APN) devoted to investigate the emissions of rice field burning and their impacfts on cloud formation processes. The project will be conducted jointly between the US Forest Service, the US National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, with partner focus in Thailand which may provide a King Air research planes; collaboration with CSIRO is envisaged (I.Galbally).

The Fire Research Campaign Asia-North (FIRESCAN)

J.G.Goldammer and B.J.Stocks reported about the recent development of the fire research component in the frame of the IGBP Northern Eurasia Study (IGBP-NES) transects along the Lena and the Yenissei rivers. Current research focus is on post-fire flux studies on sites nearby the FIRESCAN Bor Forest Island Fire Experiment of 1993 (Bor, Krasnoyarsk region).

SAFARI-2000

SAFARI 2000 is an international regional science initiative being developed to explore, study and address linkages between land-atmosphere processes and the relationship of biogenic, pyrogenic or anthropogenic emissions and the consequences of their deposition to the functioning of the biogeophysical and biogeochemical systems of southern Africa. This initiative is being built around a number of on-going, already funded activities by NASA, the international community and African nations in the southern African region.

Much like its predecessor SAFARI-92, SAFARI-2000 is more a confederation of affiliated regional and global environmental change research efforts that have secured their own funding and are currently underway or will be underway soon within southern Africa, rather than a specific, funded program. SAFARI 2000 will include the following science components: terrestrial ecosystem and biogeochemical modeling; land cover and land use change mapping; monitoring and modeling; fire disturbance studies; quantification of biomass burning emissions and emissions transport modeling; aerosol characterization and monitoring; atmospheric chemistry; and modeling and atmospheric deposition experiments.

Satellite product validation will be undertaken in the science context of these components providing validated data products as input to the above studies.

SAFARI 2000 will be conducted over a three year period starting in 1999 with field campaigns during 1999 and 2000. A synthesis product of results available in early 2001. SAFARI 2000 will add scientific value by enabling the synthesis, coordination and beginning of budget closure between these different activities within the region that will ultimately provide a contribution to a regional science assessment of global change.

NASA, through its Research and Applications (R and A) Program, EOS instrument teams and EOS Validation activities, is supporting on-going research efforts within the southern African region. In addition to NASAs African scientific collaborators, scientists from South Africa are currently securing funds through their national science foundation to support their involvement. The international regional science networks developed through IGBP and START within the region will participate in the initiative and will be the mechanism for broader African scientific involvement.

The first of SAFARI-2000 science planning workshops was held in Blydepoort, South Africa (11-17 July 1998). Bob Swap reported about the priority research objectives elaborated by the workshop participants, all mainly devoted to understand the linkages between physical, chemical and biological processes. Contact: B.Swap rjs8g@virginia.edu.

Remote sensing programs

P.M.Barbosa reported about the state of the World Fire Web which is being built at present by the Joint Research Center (JRC). The Web will consist of a network of nodes which receive and interpret fire information derived from the NOAA AVHRR.

The Global Fire Product is another activity of the JRC. In 1991, following a workshop on the requirements for terrestrial biospheric data sets and in response to requirements from the International Geosphere Biosphere Programme (IGBP) core projects, IGBP-DIS set up the Fire Working Group (FWG) to develop a consensus algorithm for global fire mapping. From this was born the concept of a Global Fire Product (GFP). This would be based on the use of an active fire detection algorithm and the global daily Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) data being collected by the IGBP-DIS 1 km AVHRR Global Land Project. A consensus algorithm was developed and approved by the FWG in 1996. Data processing was initiated at the JRC in 1996, and completed in November 1997. (For more details: see contribution by Dwyer et al., this volume of IFFN.)

Y.Kaufmann reports on the state of MODIS. J.G.Goldammer reports on the state of progress of the fire sensors development by the DLR: the BIRD satellite and the FOCUS instrument (to be deployed on the International Space Station).

Fire information systems and inventories

J.G.Goldammer reports about the Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC) which is in its establishment phase between June and December 1998. The first phase will be tested at regional base in South East Asia, and it will be expanded gradually to global scale. The GFMC is located at the Fire Ecology and Biomass Burning Research Group of the Max Planck Institute of Chemistry, Germany, at Freiburg University Airport Campus. The GFMC is financed by the government of Germany as a contribution to the UN International Decade for Natural Hazard Reduction (IDNDR). Following the principles which were developed for a scientific Global Vegetation Fire Information System, the Global Fire Monitoring Center will integrate the archived and real-time information related to fire. This will include the interlinking with other national, regional and international information systems. It is expected that the GFMC will be on the Internet by September/October 1998 (see Editorial of this issue of IFFN). Starting with the July-1998 issue International Forest Fire News (which is the official newsletter for the fire research groups of IGAC/BIBEX, IBFRA, IUFRO and the IDNDR) will be posted on the GFMC internet site.

The Global Vegetation Fire Inventory (GVFI) will be a focus of the GFMC. GVFI also contributes to the biomass bunrning emission component of the Global Emissions Inventory Activity (GEIA). The Ninth International Workshop of GEIA was held at the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (USA) 19-20 August 1998, in tandem with the CACGP/IGAC Joint International Symposium on Global Atmospheric Chemistry. B.J.Stocks reported about the state of the Northern Hemisphere fire inventory. The GEIA website is http://blueskies.sprl.umich.edu/geia/.

Partnerships with end-users

The panel discussion of the joint CACGP/IGAC symposium focused on public policy. While more questions were asked at the panel discussion than answers were given, the BIBEX community could look back to a successful involvement with governments and international organizations. The South East Asian fire and smoke episode of 1997-98 required the inputs by the fire science community into activities of various UN agencies and programmes which responded to the fires, particularly the WMO, WHO, FAO, UNEP, and IDNDR. Details are found in the pages of IFFN starting with the January 1998 issue.

BIBEX Business: BIBEX Committee membership and chair

During the closed session of the BIBEX Steering Committee proposed changes to the list of committee members were discussed and agreed upon. Based on a request from the ICAC SSC, the terms of all current BIBEX Committee members were considered to have ended. Some members of the current committee indicated that they would like to terminate their involvement involvement. Four new members were nominated. The proposals for the new composition of the BIBEX Committee will be forwarded to the IGAC SSC for their approval.

M.O.Andreae who served as founding convener of BIBEX since 1990 stepped down. The BIBEX Steering Committee members expressed their gratitude for his engagement over the years.

The committee followed the suggestion of M.O.Andreae to nominate two co-conveners to lead the BIBEX activities into a new direction (nomination to be confirmed by the IGAC SSC). Under the impression that biomass burning emissions chemistry and related atmospheric chemistry processes have been successfully explored during the lifetime of BIBEX, it was agreed that the future emphasis of BIBEX should be in the field of fire inventories (including remote sensing of fires), fire ecology, and global fire modelling.

BIBEX contact:

Johann Georg Goldammer
Fire Ecology Research Group
Max Planck Institute for Chemistry
c/o Freiburg University
P.O.Box
D – 79085 Freiburg GERMANY

Fax: ++49-761-80 80 12
Tel: ++49-761-80 80 11
e-mail: fire@ruf.uni-freiburg.de

IFFN No. 19

24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin

News from Fire Research: Workshop on Fire Disturbance in Dynamic Global Vegetation Models (IFFN No. 20 – March 1999)

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Workshop on Fire Disturbance inDynamic Global Vegetation Models

(IFFN No. 20 – March 1999,p. 97-98)

Under the frame of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) the “Core Projects” Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystems (GCTE) Focus 2, the Biospheric Aspects of the Hydrological Cycle (BAHC) International Project Office in collaboration with the IGBP International Global Atmospheric Chemistry Projects (IGAC), Biomass Burning Experiment (BIBEX), held a workshop to develop a strategy to integrate ecosystem disturbance into dynamic global vegetation models. The workshop main thrust was on fire as disturbance, but included discussion of other disturbances, such as insect and disease outbreak, land use, and extreme weather events. The workshop, hosted by the Potsdam Institute of Climate Impact Research in Potsdam Germany was held 22-24 June 1998.

Disturbance plays a major role in shaping and maintaining many of the Earth’s terrestrial ecosystems. In fact, many ecosystems depend on fire for their very existence. As example, the prairie’s of North America would be wooded Savannah if it were not for grazing and fire. Global Change is expected to result in changed distribution of current ecosystems, changed composition of those ecosystems, and in creation of new ecosystems. The International Geosphere Biosphere Programme, through the Core Projects Biospheric Aspects of the Hydrological Cycle, International Global Atmospheric Chemistry, and Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystems recognized that disturbance needed to be included in the modeling efforts of each project. Three main themes were recognize: impact of disturbance on carbon pools, vegetation change, and feedbacks to the atmosphere. This strategy was based on the fact that biomass burning influences atmospheric chemistry, that feedbacks of energy, water and trace gases to the atmosphere are influenced by vegetation, and that changes in the composition of ecosystems have direct impact on the carbon pool, on biodiversity, and health and productivity of the land. Disturbance includes fire, insect, disease, drought and flooding, land conversion, land use, air pollution, and introduction of exotic species. While it will be necessary to ultimately include all disturbances, the Potsdam workshop limited itself to fire. This strategy is based on the fact that there are no process driven models for all disturbances, and that fire has a number of reliable models with which to begin the process of introducing disturbance into dynamic global vegetation models. While this workshop limited itself to fire, a great deal of consideration was given to the fact that the model shell must be able to include other disturbances in the future. As a result, the strategy was to focus on a hazard function which would lead to effects of disturbance. The hazard function is basically a probability statement of risk of effects. This approach is equally valid for all forms of disturbance.

Workshop Recommendations and Challenges

The inclusion of disturbance models within DGVMs creates a number of unique challenges for model development, calibration, and verification. These challenges include:

Optimum model formulation for disturbances cannot be currently specified. Therefore, alternative model approaches must be systematically implemented, tested and compared. Criteria for comparison of disturbance modules should be based on the adequacy of their representation of the disturbance regime and subsequent effects of disturbances on vegetation.

Model comparison is dependent upon the adequacy of data describing vegetation structure, land-use, and reconstruction of historical climate and fire history. Some of these data may never be available at a global scale. Therefore, construction of such data for different regions (e.g., boreal, tropical, savanna, etc.) should be developed as case studies for model comparison.

Plant functional types (PFTs) used in DGVMs are not yet specifically designed to account for responses to disturbance. Detailed consideration must be given to the possible need to expand the definition of PFTs to include disturbance effects.

Inclusion of fine-grained details of vegetation response to disturbances within coarse-grained DGVMs is difficult from both a practical and theoretical standpoint. Theory suggests that predictions across temporal and spatial scales is possible for single attributes (i.e., either mean, variance, or extreme disturbance events), but prediction in shifts of disturbance regimes are difficult to characterize by simple models alone.

A general disturbance framework for inclusions within DGVMs should account for multiple disturbance agents. The present challenge is to consider both fire and insect disturbance(and the interaction between fire and insect effects)within different vegetation types.

Because fire and insect effects are contagion processes, the simulation of coarse-grained dynamics of disturbance effects may benefit from fine-grained descriptions of the spatial heterogeneity of vegetation and land-use.

The spatial scales associated with both data and models for development and testing of prediction of global change are arbitrary. Systematic investigation of aggregation errors and resulting prediction bias associated with inconsistencies in scales between models and data is a needed to insure the adequacy of current descriptions and future predictions.

Plant ecophysiological responses to multiple disturbances are poorly understood, making the interaction between fire, insects and plant physiology difficult to simulate. Response functions that describe changes in DGVM ecophysiological parameters as a consequence of disturbance are needed to accurately simulate vegetation dynamics.

Identification of disturbances which may act at global scales to affect patterns of growth and productivity of vegetation remains a significant challenge for DGVM models.

Specific research tasks need to be designed to address the above issues in order to insure that model projections adequately and reliably reflect changes in vegetation dynamics as a consequence of global climate change, land-use change and disturbance.

A detailed paper resulting from the workshop is entitled “Strategy for a fire module in global dynamic vegetation models” and will be published in one of the forthcoming issues of the International Journal of Wildland Fire.

Michael A.Fosberg BAHC Core Project Office
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK)
Telegrafenberg
P.O.Box 60 12 03
D – 14412 Potsdam
Germany

Fax: ++49-331-288-2547
e-mail: bahc@pik-potsdam.de

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IFFN No. 20

24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin

News from Fire Research: Prometheus System Validation Fire Experiment in Switzerland (IFFN No. 20 – January 1999)

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Prometheus System Validation Fire Experiment in Switzerland

(IFFN No. 20 – January 1999,p. 93-96)

Background

In the frame of the EU-project Prometheus s.v. the branch station South of the Alps of the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research organised a small fire experiment in a sweet chestnut stand in Southern Switzerland (S. Antonino, Canton Ticino). Due to the fire regime conditions in this part of Switzerland (winter forest fire season in the deciduous forest belt, surface fires) the fire experiment took place on 28 March 1998.

Altogether 16 research groups participated in this fire experiment. These groups were mainly from the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) and his branch station (FNP SdA), the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETHZ), the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research in Dübendorf (EMPA), the Departments of Geography of the Universities of Basle and Bern and the Fire Ecology Research Group of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry at the University of Freiburg (Germany).

The different groups of the WSL studied fire propagation and temperature development during the fire, post-fire runoff and soil erosion, effects of the fire to fauna, vegetation and chestnut blight, fine root and mycorrhiza regeneration after the fire and the influence of the fire to soil chemical properties and the soil water. The Institute for Geophysics of the ETHZ took soil samples for rock-magnetic investigations. The EMPA measured the fire temperatures with a mobile IR-camera. The Department of Geography of Bern did splash erosion measurement as well as infiltration and soil aggregate stability measurements and the Department of Geography of the University of Basle did soil respiration and soil microbial biomass measurements. Last but not least the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry took emission samples. The arrangements of all test plots and the location of the point measurements can be seen in the general map (Fig. 1) (149 KB).

Other groups, who participated in the fire experiment were from the Swiss Army and the local fire brigades. The Army took IR-pictures with a video camera from a helicopter and was responsible for setting the fire in a line and the local fire brigades were responsible for making a fire break and to control the fire.

Design of the Fire Experiment

The fire experiment was carried out on a north facing slope with a medium inclination of 30 degrees. The size of the experimental site (inclusive control area) was about 1 ha. The total burnt size was 0.23 ha. One main intentions of the fire experiment was to simulate two different fire intensities ant to study ecological effects of a forest fire in relation to fire intensity. Therefore the upper part of the fire experiment test area was let untreated (fuel load was about 1 kg dry material / m2). and in the lower part we put about one more kilo of chestnut litter per square meter.

Already more than half a year before the fire experiment the first research groups started with taking samples and monitoring the fire experiment test site. Tension lysimeters (ceramic cups) were placed at three different soil levels (20-25 cm; 50-55 cm; 75-80 cm) on the upper and lower part of the fire experiment test site. Every two weeks samples of the soil water were taken and analysed in the laboratory. In every water sample pH, water conductivity and the amount of total organic compounds (TOC) as well as anion and cation concentration were measured. At the same time the first vegetation studies on the fire experiment test site, based on relevés, were conducted as plant sociological surveys over 100 m2 plots using the combined scale after Braun-Blanquet (1964) for estimating frequency. Also pitfall traps, ground eclectors and combination traps (window trap and yellow pan) were installed for collecting insects, spiders and millepedes. The first soil respiration and infiltration measurements were carried out some days before the fire experiment and soil samples for chemical and physical analyses as well as for rock-magnetic investigations and mycorrhiza fungi studies were taken the days before the fire experiment. The day before the fire experiment soil samples with a cylindrical sampler of 1 dm3 (010 cm) were taken to determine the pre-fire soil moisture content. Finally just before setting the fire, fuel samples (0.5 m x 0.5 m) were taken to determine fuel load and fuel moisture content.

Fig.2. and 3. Start of the fire experiment at the lower portion of the slope with relatively high fire intensity (upper) and calming down of fire intensity in the upper portion of the burning plot (lower). Photos: J.G.Goldammer

Three weather stations were installed some days before the fire to monitor the weather conditions during the fire experiment. Every minute a medium value of the air temperature, air humidity, wind direction and wind speed was stored with Skye-Instruments data loggers. Then, in the morning of 28 March, the fire was set at 09:30 by specialists of the Swiss Army.

For monitoring the fire spread 31 N-type thermocouples (fifteen thermocouples in the fuel bed at + 10 cm, eight in a depth of 2.5 cm and eight in a depth of 5 cm) were connected to a Campbell CR10X datalogger with an AM416 multiplexer and distributed to the fire experiment area (see general map). Every two seconds a temperature measurement was made. In addition a mobile IR camera (NEC TH 3101) with a resolution of 256 x 207 pixels was mounted on a tree about 8 m above the ground for monitoring a surface of about 335 m2 and a FLIR 2000 system (Forward Looking Infra Red), mounted on a Alouette III helicopter of the Swiss army, was flying diagonal over the fire experiment and taking online IR-video pictures of the fire spread for about one hour. Last but not least there was a ground crew who noted the passage of the fire and the flame length at certain points and another group as well as the TV were taking video and photo pictures throughout the fire experiment. Also during the fire the group of the Max Planck Institute took emission samples in the control area and the fire experimental test site.

Shortly after the fire experiment the first groups started their investigations. The traps for collecting insects were reinstalled and at the same time another group was already looking for surviving insects. Soil samples for the different investigations were taken, the first infiltration and soil respiration measurements carried out and the runoff and soil erosion testplots, the splash boards as well as an automatically raingauge and five precipitation totalizers installed. The first soil water samples were taken two days after the fire.

Most post-fire investigations were carried on until the end of 1998 and some like runoff and soil erosion measurements, vegetation, fine root and mycorrhiza fungi regeneration and soil water and chestnut blight studies will be carried on also in 1999.

First results are expected for the end of 1999 and will be discussed in the frame of the Prometheus s.v. project.

Acknowledgements

We wish to express our thanks to the Prometheus coordinator (Algosystems S.A.; Greece) and all Prometheus partners as well as the group landscape inventories of the WSL for creating the general map of the fire experiment. The financial support for the Swiss part of the Prometheus s.v. project of the Swiss Federal Office for Education and Science (BBW-Project No. 97.0058) is gratefully acknowledged.

Reference:

Braun-Blanquet, J. 1964: Pflanzensoziologie. Wien, Springer. 865 p.

Peter Marxer & Marco Conedera Swiss Federal Institute for Forest,
Snow and Landscape Research
FNP Sottostazione Sud delle Alpi
PO Box 57
CH – 6504 Bellinzona-Ravecchia

Tel. ++41-91-821 52 30
Fax ++41-91-821 52 39
e-mail: peter.marxer@wsl.ch
marco.conedera@wsl.ch
Internet: http://www.wsl.ch

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IFFN No. 20
Research & Technology

24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin

News from Fire Research: The International Crown Fire Modelling Experiment – an Update (IFFN No. 21 – September 1999)

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NEWS FROM FIRE RESEARCH:

The International Crown Fire Modelling Experiment – an Update

(IFFN No. 21 – September 1999,p. 89-90)

The third phase of the International Crown Fire Modelling Experiment (ICFME) was successfully completed in late June and early July of 1999 near Fort Providence in Canada’s Northwest Territories. Designed primarily to develop knowledge and data essential to predicting the initiation and propagation of high-intensity crown fires, ICFME has been expanded to include the evaluation of personal protective equipment (including fire shelters), smoke chemistry analyses, investigations into the effect of fuels modification on fire behaviour, and the assessment/evaluation of community housing fire protection standards.

Conducted under the auspices of the International Boreal Forest Research Association (IBFRA) and the International Geosphere-Biosphere Program (IGBP), and coordinated by the Canadian Forest Service (CFS), the Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT), and the United States Forest Service (USFS), the ICFME has brought together 50-70 research and operational personnel annually during the past three years. In addition to CFS, GNWT and USFS participants, researchers from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Commonwealth Society of Industrial Research Organizations (CSIRO) in Australia, the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry (MPIC) in Germany, and universities in Canada, the United States, Japan, the Netherlands, and South Africa have participated. The GNWT and the community of Fort Providence have provided the cooperation and logistical support necessary to undertake this large research endeavour.

To date, eleven successful crown fires have been conducted (three in 1997, two in 1998, and six in 1999). These have been the most complex and heavily-instrumented experimental crown fires ever conducted in the northern hemisphere, and a large amount of data has been successfully gathered. This data is currently being evaluated, and a data reduction workshop which will involve all key participants is scheduled for December 1999. Data and knowledge gaps identified at this workshop will be addressed next summer in the final phase of ICFME. Background information, summary progress reports, media coverage, and selected photography from the ICFME is available at the ICFME Home Page (http://www.nofc.cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/fire/fmn/nwt/).

Fig.1. Aerial view of the ICFME experimental plots in the Northwest Territories, Canada.

Submitted by the ICFME Co-Coordinators:

B.J. Stocks, Canadian Forest Service (CFS)
M.E. Alexander (CFS), and
R.A. Lanoville, Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT)

ICFME Home Page: http://www.nofc.cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/fire/fmn/nwt/

Contact:

Brian J.Stocks
Senior Research Scientist
Forest Fire and Global Change
Canadian Forest Service
Natural Resources Canada
1219 Queen Street East
Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario P6A 5M7
CANADA

Fax: ++1-705-759-5700
Tel: ++1-705-759-5740-2181
e-mail: bstocks@nrcan.gc.ca

IFFN No. 21

24. November 2017/by GFMCadmin