 Forest Floor Consumption and Smoke Characterization in Boreal Forested
Fuelbed Types of Alaska
  Final
Report to the Joint Fire Science Program [.pdf 1.4 MB]
Many areas of the boreal forest of Alaska contain deep layers of moss,
duff, and peat, resulting in a large pool of biomass that potentially
can burn and smolder for long periods of time creating hazardous smoke
episodes for local residents and communities and causing detrimental landscape
impacts. Research to quantify fuel consumption, flammability thresholds,
and smoke production in boreal forest types is critical for effective
modeling of fire effects (e.g. smoke emissions, regional haze, permafrost
melting, erosion, plant succession, etc) and landscape management if prescribed
burning is to become an important land management technique in the future.
Preliminary research has generated a hypothesis of the controlling variables
that govern the fuel consumption in the moss and duff layers, but this
hypothesis needs to be verified and tested through field-based experimentation.
Very limited smoke emissions characterization has been completed.
The purpose of this study was to collect fuel consumption data and characterize
smoke emissions on active wildfires and prescribed fires. The data was
used to develop new and modify existing forest floor fuel consumption
models and develop emission rate equations for the boreal forest fuelbed
type. The fuel consumption and emission factors and rate equations were
implemented into the software program Consume
3.0 to better predict moss/peat/duff fuel consumption and smoke production
during wildland fires in Alaska. This research makes Consume 3.0 and other
fuel consumption, fire effects, and smoke production models more robust
and aid managers, planners, and researchers in developing environmentally,
socially, and legally responsible land management plans. This research
will also allow for a more effective and informed use of emission production
and wildfire/prescribed fire trade-off models providing improved wildland
fire emissions accounting and planning at the local, regional, and global
scales. The fuel consumption and smoke characterization module will be
a scientifically based support tool that can be used to improve fire management
decision processes.
Team Lead: Roger
Ottmar
Collaborators: BLM Alaska Fire Service, National Park
Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, Alaska
Fish and Game, Alaska Division of Forestry, Rocky Mountain Research Station
 We acknowledge funding from the Joint
Fire Science Program under Project JFSP 03-3-1-08.
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