scholarly journals Prototyping a Geospatial Atlas for Wildfire Planning and Management

Forests ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 909
Author(s):  
Matthew P. Thompson ◽  
Benjamin M. Gannon ◽  
Michael D. Caggiano ◽  
Christopher D. O’Connor ◽  
April Brough ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Support ◽  
Fire Management ◽  
Response Strategy ◽  
Strategy Development ◽  
Management Decision ◽  
Support Tool ◽  
Response Planning ◽  
Planning And Management ◽  
Key Innovation ◽  
Wildfire Planning

Wildland fire managers are increasingly embracing risk management principles by being more anticipatory, proactive, and “engaging the fire before it starts”. This entails investing in pre-season, cross-boundary, strategic fire response planning with partners and stakeholders to build a shared understanding of wildfire risks and management opportunities. A key innovation in planning is the development of potential operational delineations (PODs), i.e., spatial management units whose boundaries are relevant to fire containment operations (e.g., roads, ridgetops, and fuel transitions), and within which potential fire consequences, suppression opportunities/challenges, and strategic response objectives can be analyzed to inform fire management decision making. As of the summer of 2020, PODs have been developed on more than forty landscapes encompassing National Forest System lands across the western USA, providing utility for planning, communication, mitigation prioritization, and incident response strategy development. Here, we review development of a decision support tool—a POD Atlas—intended to facilitate cross-boundary, collaborative strategic wildfire planning and management by providing high-resolution information on landscape conditions, values at risk, and fire management resource needs for individual PODs. With the atlas, users can rapidly access and assimilate multiple forms of pre-loaded data and analytics in a customizable manner. We prototyped and operationalized this tool in concert with, and for use by, fire managers on several National Forests in the Southern Rocky Mountains of the USA. We present examples, discuss real-world use cases, and highlight opportunities for continued decision support improvement.

Depression-Management Decision Support Tool

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helene Starks ◽  
Jennifer L. Shaw ◽  
Vanessa Hiratsuka ◽  
Denise A. Dillard ◽  
Renee Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Decision Support ◽  
Decision Support Tool ◽  
Management Decision ◽  
Support Tool ◽  
Depression Management ◽  
Management Decision Support

The forest protection service: a risk management decision support tool

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefano Bruzzese ◽  
Simone Blanc ◽  
Filippo Brun
Keyword(s):  
Risk Management ◽  
Decision Support ◽  
Natural Hazards ◽  
Stated Preference ◽  
Decision Support Tool ◽  
Management Decision ◽  
Target Market ◽  
Forest Protection ◽  
Large Spatial Scale ◽  
Support Tool

<p>In recent years in mountain areas, natural hazards such as rockfalls, avalanches and mudflows, triggered by ongoing climate change have increased in both frequency and magnitude. Hazards that, accompanied by increasing demographic pressure, socio-economic and land-use changes, especially in the Alpine region, have called for a greater need for human protection. This demand can be met with artificial structures, such as rockfall nets and avalanche fences, or with natural solutions, such as forests if properly managed. However, the protection service provided by forests, against natural hazards is difficult to value because it has no target market. Therefore, providing a value for this service would allow it to be integrated into risk management plans and programs. In this work, we analyzed from a qualitative and quantitative point of view the most widely used economic methods for estimating the protection service provided by forests against natural hazards, providing a decision support tool for stakeholders involved in risk management. The main results indicate that, depending on the resources and time available, as well as the spatial and temporal scale required, some methods are preferable to others. The Replacement Cost method is well suited to most operational contexts in which stakeholders may find themselves, as it is replicable, cost-effective and results are reliable and easily communicated. Although the Avoided Damages method refers to market data and is also capable of estimating indirect costs, it has the limitation of being site-specific. While the stated preference methods are suited for long-term evaluations on a large spatial scale, they require a high level of expertise and are costly in terms of both time and resources. From our analysis, we can conclude that the provided decision support tool should not replace the human ability to analyze complex situations, but rather be an aid to this process. The combination of this tool with others, such as frameworks and guidelines, provides a flexible support system aimed at improving the design and implementation of future ecosystem service assessments and management, as well as related decision-making.</p>

Development of Oil Spill Response Decision Support Tool for Aerial Spraying of Dispersants

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 (1) ◽  
pp. 725-744
Author(s):  
Craig Dillon-Gibbons ◽  
Cameron Galtry ◽  
Nicholas Boustead ◽  
Nicholas D’Arcy-Evans ◽  
Phillip Kurts ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Support ◽  
Oil Spill ◽  
Near Field ◽  
Decision Support Tool ◽  
Particle Dispersion ◽  
Spray Drift ◽  
Operational Mode ◽  
Support Tool ◽  
Response Planning ◽  
Oil Spill Response

2017-280 Abstract This paper describes the development of a Decision Support Tool (DST) for response planning associated with aerial operations for offshore oil spills. The research program was formulated to include characterization of dispersant spray drift through numerical modeling to generate a database of drift response for a range of airframes and environmental conditions. The drift of aerial dispersants is dependent on a number of different influences including airframe shape and aerodynamics, environmental effects, flight conditions and aerial dispersant make up. As with agricultural spraying, oil spill response spraying has the potential of spray drift to impact upon ecologically sensitive regions and/or areas occupied by people or marine mammals surfacing in the spill area. The development of the DST included an evaluation of existing regulatory models, investigating their application to the offshore environment. It was found that, due to inherent limitations and simplifications, particularly for the larger airframes considered, the existing models were under conservative in comparison with Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) models in the near field wake regions for offshore spraying purposes. To address these issues, a combination of scaling factors and the use of inviscid vortex transport and particle dispersion models were adopted for inclusion in the DST. It is envisaged that, once validated further, the DST will become an invaluable tool for Oil Spill Response Operators (OSROs) and decision planners in both the operational mode of providing information to aid in establishing setback distances and in the planning mode to assist with the identification of windows of opportunity conducive to spraying operations.

Development of Oil Spill Response Decision Support Tool for Aerial Spraying of Dispersants

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 (1) ◽  
pp. 2017-280
Author(s):  
Craig Dillon-Gibbons ◽  
Cameron Galtry ◽  
Nicholas Boustead ◽  
Nicholas D'Arcy-Evans ◽  
Phillip Kurts ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Support ◽  
Oil Spill ◽  
Near Field ◽  
Decision Support Tool ◽  
Particle Dispersion ◽  
Spray Drift ◽  
Operational Mode ◽  
Support Tool ◽  
Response Planning ◽  
Oil Spill Response

2017-280 Abstract This paper describes the development of a Decision Support Tool (DST) for response planning associated with aerial operations for offshore oil spills. The research program was formulated to include characterization of dispersant spray drift through numerical modeling to generate a database of drift response for a range of airframes and environmental conditions. The drift of aerial dispersants is dependent on a number of different influences including airframe shape and aerodynamics, environmental effects, flight conditions and aerial dispersant make up. As with agricultural spraying, oil spill response spraying has the potential of spray drift to impact upon ecologically sensitive regions and/or areas occupied by people or marine mammals surfacing in the spill area. The development of the DST included an evaluation of existing regulatory models, investigating their application to the offshore environment. It was found that, due to inherent limitations and simplifications, particularly for the larger airframes considered, the existing models were under conservative in comparison with Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) models in the near field wake regions for offshore spraying purposes. To address these issues, a combination of scaling factors and the use of inviscid vortex transport and particle dispersion models were adopted for inclusion in the DST. It is envisaged that, once validated further, the DST will become an invaluable tool for Oil Spill Response Operators (OSROs) and decision planners in both the operational mode of providing information to aid in establishing setback distances and in the planning mode to assist with the identification of windows of opportunity conducive to spraying operations.

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