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During the five decades since its origin, law and economics has provided an influential framework for addressing a wide array of areas of law ranging from judicial behaviour to contracts. This book will reflects the first-ever forum for law and economics scholars to apply the analysis and methodologies of their field to the subject of wildfire. The only modern legal work on wildfire, the book brings together leading scholars to consider questions such as: How can public policy address the effects of climate change on wildfire, and wildfire on climate change? Are the environmental and fiscal costs of ex ante prevention measures justified? What are the appropriate levels of prevention and suppression responsibility borne by private, state, and federal actors? Can tort liability provide a solution for realigning the grossly distorted incentives that currently exist for private landowners and government firefighters? Do the existing incentives in wildfire institutions provide incentives for efficient private and collective action and how might they be improved?

Climate extremes, poor management and lax laws are making this World Heritage Site prone to fierce fires. Researchers and governments must develop a plan to manage these risks together. Climate extremes, poor management and lax laws are making this World Heritage Site prone to fierce fires. Researchers and governments must develop a plan to manage these risks together.

Track connections between hurricanes, wildfires, climate change and other risks, urge Amir AghaKouchak and colleagues. Track connections between hurricanes, wildfires, climate change and other risks, urge Amir AghaKouchak and colleagues.

Forest fires are usually viewed within the context of a single fire season, in which weather conditions and fuel supply can combine to create conditions favourable for fire ignition—usually by lightning or human activity—and spread 1 – 3 . But some fires exhibit ‘overwintering’ behaviour, in which they smoulder through the non-fire season and flare up in the subsequent spring 4 , 5 . In boreal (northern) forests, deep organic soils favourable for smouldering 6 , along with accelerated climate warming 7 , may present unusually favourable conditions for overwintering. However, the extent of overwintering in boreal forests and the underlying factors influencing this behaviour remain unclear. Here we show that overwintering fires in boreal forests are associated with hot summers generating large fire years and deep burning into organic soils, conditions that have become more frequent in our study areas in recent decades. Our results are based on an algorithm with which we detect overwintering fires in Alaska, USA, and the Northwest Territories, Canada, using field and remote sensing datasets. Between 2002 and 2018, overwintering fires were responsible for 0.8 per cent of the total burned area; however, in one year this amounted to 38 per cent. The spatiotemporal predictability of overwintering fires could be used by fire management agencies to facilitate early detection, which may result in reduced carbon emissions and firefighting costs. Large forest fires in Alaska and the Northwest Territories can ‘overwinter’ and then reignite in the following fire season, contributing up to one-third of the burned area in individual years.

Wildfires have increased in size and frequency in recent decades in many biomes, but have they also become more severe? This question remains under-examined despite fire severity being a critical aspect of fire regimes that indicates fire impacts on ecosystem attributes and associated post-fire recovery. We conducted a retrospective analysis of wildfires larger than 1000 ha in south-eastern Australia to examine the extent and spatial pattern of high-severity burned areas between 1987 and 2017. High-severity maps were generated from Landsat remote sensing imagery. Total and proportional high-severity burned area increased through time. The number of high-severity patches per year remained unchanged but variability in patch size increased, and patches became more aggregated and more irregular in shape. Our results confirm that wildfires in southern Australia have become more severe. This shift in fire regime may have critical consequences for ecosystem dynamics, as fire-adapted temperate forests are more likely to be burned at high severities relative to historical ranges, a trend that seems set to continue under projections of a hotter, drier climate in south-eastern Australia.

Wildfires are becoming more and more frequent around the world, making expertise in the field a hot commodity. Wildfires are becoming more and more frequent around the world, making expertise in the field a hot commodity. Mike Flannigan

Advice to the Biden administration as it seeks to account for mounting losses from storms, wildfires and other climate impacts. Advice to the Biden administration as it seeks to account for mounting losses from storms, wildfires and other climate impacts.

Extreme bushfires are devastating and costly and are predicted to increase in frequency. This project investigated emergency responders’ (ER) compensable injury/disease costs associated with extreme bushfire periods compared with the general workforce. Workers’ compensation claims data for Victoria, Australia, were sourced for ER and controls (10% of the general workforce) from January 2005 to April 2021 (encompassing two extreme bushfires). Using generalised linear models, claims from ambulance officers, career firefighters, police, and controls were compared across extreme bushfires, other summers, and all other periods. In total, ER made 749/24,008 (3.1%) claims in extreme bushfire periods, compared to 1254/49,484 (2.5%) in the controls. The study group overall (including both ER and the general workforce control group) experienced significantly higher income compensation costs/claims during extreme bushfire periods, with a 31% increase. ER’ costs/claims were highest for mental illness, burns and cancer. After accounting for bushfire impacts on the general workforce, total claims costs were increased by 67% among firefighters in extreme bushfire periods, largely attributable to fatality payments (other non-medical expenses). These results highlight the need for targeted injury prevention for fatal and non-fatal injuries among ERs and measures that address the broader socio-economic impacts on ERs and the general workforce.

When a fire occurs, there is little time to escape. In less than 30 seconds, a fire can rage out of control, filling the area with heat and toxic thick smoke (Purdue University Fire Department, 2017; http://www.purdue.edu/ehps/fire/fire-101.html.) In 2010, following the successful evacuation of Maale Ha’Carmel Mental Health Center during a raging forest fire in the area, a comprehensive investigation was performed to evaluate the management of the evacuation process and to systematically elicit lessons learned from the incident. In 2016, a forest fire erupted in the same geographic area that required the evacuation of Fliman Geriatric Rehabilitation Hospital, and methodical debriefing identified the strengths and weaknesses of the evacuation process in that hospital. The lessons learned from the evacuation of these two health care facilities, which were at the focus of major fires in Israel in 2010 and in 2016, are presented. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2019;13:375–379)

Recent growth in the frequency and severity of US wildfires has led to more wildfire smoke and increased public exposure to harmful air pollutants. Populations exposed to wildfire smoke experience a variety of negative health impacts, imposing economic costs on society. However, few estimates of smoke health costs exist and none for the entire Western US, in particular, which experiences some of the largest and most intense wildfires in the US. The lack of cost estimates is troublesome because smoke health impacts are an important consideration of the overall costs of wildfire. To address this gap, this study provides the first time series estimates of PM2.5 smoke costs across mortality and several morbidity measures for the Western US over 2005–2015. This time period includes smoke from several megafires and includes years of record-breaking acres burned. Smoke costs are estimated using a benefits transfer protocol developed for contexts when original health data are not available. The novelty of our protocol is that it synthesizes the literature on choices faced by researchers when conducting a smoke cost benefit transfer. On average, wildfire smoke in the Western US creates $165 million in annual morbidity and mortality health costs.