Generation of Tree-level Fire Fuel Information across MPB Infestation Mosaics

MPB-induced tree mortality alters wildfire fuel availability in an affected stand, and the mosaic of tree status (green, red, and grey) will impact the severity and frequency of wildfires. This project will build a library of fuel characteristics and MPB attack status across a variety of stand types in western Canada which will be used as an input into next-generation wildfire behavior models. This information will improve wildfire behaviour predictions used when making decisions about land management to increase public safety.

Objectives

1. To locate a series of typical MPB mosaic stands of green, red and gray attack trees across Western Alberta, covering a range of initial forest type and environmental conditions.
2. o either acquire existing contemporary LiDAR or fly UAV based LiDAR data over transects at these sites to capture changes in fuel availability.
3. To apply, derive and verify the models that extract a series of individual tree based attributes shown to be highly relevant to fuel assessment.
4. To build look up tables which describes these tree-level attributes by stand composition, degree of attack, and other environmental conditions, and provide these to fire ecologists for improved model parameterization.