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Fuel Treatment for Forest Resilience and Climate Mitigation: a Critical Review for Coniferous Forests of California

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Fuel Treatment for Forest Resilience and Climate Mitigation: a Critical Review for Coniferous Forests of California FUEL TREATMENT FOR FOREST RESILIENCE AND CLIMATE MITIGATION: A CRITICAL REVIEW FOR CONIFEROUS FORESTS OF CALIFORNIA A Report for: California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment Prepared By: Jason J. Moghaddas¹, Gary B. Roller¹, Jonathan W. Long4, David S. Saah1, Max A. Moritz³, Dan T. Stark³, David A. Schmidt¹, Thomas Buchholz¹, Travis J. Freed¹, Erin C. Alvey¹, John S. Gunn² 1 Spatial Informatics Group, LLC 2 Spatial Informatics Group - Natural Assets Laboratory 3 University of California Cooperative Extension 4 USDA Pacific Northwest Research Station DISCLAIMER This report was prepared as the result of work sponsored by the California Natural Resources Agency. It does not necessarily represent the views of the Natural Resources Agency, its employees, or the State of California. The Natural Resources Agency, the State of California, its employees, contractors, and subcontractors make no warrant, expressed or implied, and assume no legal liability for the information in this report; nor does any party represent that the uses of this information will infringe upon privately owned rights. This report has not been approved or disapproved by the Natural Resources Agency nor has the Natural Resources Agency passed upon the accuracy or adequacy of the information in this report. Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Governor August 2018 CCCA4-CNRA-2018-017 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors would like to thank Dr. Brandon Collins, Mrs. Kathleen Bagby, and 3 anonymous reviewers for their review of this manuscript. i PREFACE California’s Climate Change Assessments provide a scientific foundation for understanding climate-related vulnerability at the local scale and informing resilience actions. These Assessments contribute to the advancement of science-based policies, plans, and programs to promote effective climate leadership in California. In 2006, California released its First Climate Change Assessment, which shed light on the impacts of climate change on specific sectors in California and was instrumental in supporting the passage of the landmark legislation Assembly Bill 32 (Núñez, Chapter 488, Statutes of 2006), California’s Global Warming Solutions Act. The Second Assessment concluded that adaptation is a crucial complement to reducing greenhouse gas emissions (2009), given that some changes to the climate are ongoing and inevitable, motivating and informing California’s first Climate Adaptation Strategy released the same year. In 2012, California’s Third Climate Change Assessment made substantial progress in projecting local impacts of climate change, investigating consequences to human and natural systems, and exploring barriers to adaptation. Under the leadership of Governor Edmund G. Brown, Jr., a trio of state agencies jointly managed and supported California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment: California’s Natural Resources Agency (CNRA), the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research (OPR), and the California Energy Commission (Energy Commission). The Climate Action Team Research Working Group, through which more than 20 state agencies coordinate climate-related research, served as the steering committee, providing input for a multisector call for proposals, participating in selection of research teams, and offering technical guidance throughout the process. California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment (Fourth Assessment) advances actionable science that serves the growing needs of state and local-level decision-makers from a variety of sectors. It includes research to develop rigorous, comprehensive climate change scenarios at a scale suitable for illuminating regional vulnerabilities and localized adaptation strategies in California; datasets and tools that improve integration of observed and projected knowledge about climate change into decision-making; and recommendations and information to directly inform vulnerability assessments and adaptation strategies for California’s energy sector, water resources and management, oceans and coasts, forests, wildfires, agriculture, biodiversity and habitat, and public health. The Fourth Assessment includes 44 technical reports to advance the scientific foundation for understanding climate-related risks and resilience options, nine regional reports plus an oceans and coast report to outline climate risks and adaptation options, reports on tribal and indigenous issues as well as climate justice, and a comprehensive statewide summary report. All research contributing to the Fourth Assessment was peer-reviewed to ensure scientific rigor and relevance to practitioners and stakeholders. For the full suite of Fourth Assessment research products, please visit www.climateassessment.ca.gov. This report advances the understanding of fuel treatments as a potential mitigation for wildfire hazard and risk, associated carbon storage, and wildfire emissions. ii ABSTRACT Forest ecosystems in California contain some of the highest densities (mass per unit area) of carbon anywhere in the world (Gonzalez et al. 2015) as well as some of the highest rates of forest productivity of any temperate forest in the world (Hudiburg et al. 2009). Gonzalez et al. (2015) reported a net aboveground live carbon loss in California from 2001 to 2010 that was driven by wildfire occurrence on 6% of the state’s land area. Climate change is expected to increase the frequency and intensity of wildfires which increases the probability that California’s forests will be a net emitter of carbon. Fuel reduction treatments that reduce stand density and restore beneficial fire to the landscape can improve climate change resilience of forests and potentially minimize future emissions by reducing the amount of large and severe wildfires. As part of California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment, this project reviewed what is known about the effects of fuel treatments on carbon dynamics in California’s forests. The project also summarized geo-spatial data gaps to be filled to make sound fuel treatment decisions to increase both forest resilience and carbon sequestration. Finally, the work helps provide a scientific basis for the development of offset methodologies in the voluntary and regulatory marketplace that could generate much-needed revenue to implement beneficial climate projects in California. This report summarizes the findings from 12 key questions that focus on fuel treatments as a potential mitigation for wildfire hazard and risk, associated carbon storage, and wildfire emissions. The findings reported are based on a detailed review of over 150 peer-reviewed scientific papers and reports. To the extent possible, all reports are sourced from research conducted on forest types within California. Keywords: Wildfire, carbon, California, fuel treatment, wildfire emissions Please use the following citation for this paper: Moghaddas1, Jason J., Roller1, Gary B., Long4, Jonathan W., Saah1, David S., Moritz3, Max A., Stark3, Dan T., Schmidt1, David A., Buchholz1, Thomas, Freed1, Travis J., Alvey1, Erin C., and 2Gunn, John S. (1Spatial Informatics Group, LLC; 2Spatial Informatics Group Natural Assets Laboratory; 3University of California Cooperative Extension; 4USDA Pacific Northwest Research Station). 2018. Fuel Treatment for Forest Resilience and Climate Mitigations: A Critical Review for Coniferous Forests of the Sierra Nevada, Southern Cascade, Coast, Klamath, and Transverse Ranges. California Natural Resources Agency. Publication number: CCCA4-CNRA-2018-017. iii HIGHLIGHTS ● Fuel treatments that use a combination of thinning from below and prescribed fire or prescribed fire alone with adequate consumption of surface fuels and increased crown separation have been shown to reduce fire severity within and adjacent to treated areas. ● Fuel treatments can also be integrated with suppression actions to facilitate the movement of personnel and equipment or to gain efficiency in rates of fire line construction and aerial retardant penetration to surface fuels. ● Under extreme fire weather conditions, specifically with high winds, fires may simply burn through or spot over a fuel treatment and continue burning into adjacent untreated fuels. ● Under extreme fire weather and behavior, conditions in the fuel treatment itself may still be too dangerous to effectively utilize in conjunction with suppression resources. ● The areas of the landscape most prone to facilitating fire spread must be effectively treated in terms of overall scale to mitigate high severity fire at the landscape level. ● Whether or not fuel treatments safeguard enough carbon to offset their carbon cost depends on many factors including forest structure, existing fuel loads, expected wildfire frequency and severity, regeneration rates, fuel treatment type and intensity, and the fate of merchantable forest products. A key issue is the probability of fire occurring after treatment implementation; treatments that are not impacted by wildfire will not result in reduced potential wildfire emissions. ● Bark beetles have a narrow host range or are host specific and at endemic population levels colonize overstocked, weakened, stressed, and/or previously damaged trees; therefore, fuel treatments that target stand composition and density can impact the amount and severity of bark beetle attack and can also reduce stand susceptibility to bark beetle attack. ● The effect of salvage logging on individual carbon pools is not always predictable. Soil carbon is generally stable. Salvage harvesting will decrease the dead tree carbon pool, but other pools such as surface fuels may increase or decrease
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