Abstract
Quantifying livelihood vulnerability to wildland fires in the United States is challenging because of the need to systematically integrate multidimensional variables into its analysis. We aim to measure wildfire threats amongst humans and their physical and social environment by developing a framework to calculate the livelihood vulnerability index (LVI) for the top 14 American states most recently exposed to wildfires. The LVI is computed by assessing each state’s contributing factors (exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity) to wildfire events. These contributing factors are determined through a set of indicator variables that are categorized into corresponding groups to produce an LVI framework. The framework is validated by performing a principal component analysis (PCA), ensuring that each selected indicator variable corresponds to the correct contributing factor. Our results indicate that Arizona and New Mexico experience the greatest livelihood vulnerability. In contrast, California, Florida, and Texas experience the least livelihood vulnerability. While California has one of the highest exposures and sensitivity to wildfires, results indicate that it has a relatively high adaptive capacity, in comparison to the other states, suggesting it has measures in place to withstand these vulnerabilities. These results are critical to wildfire managers, government, policymakers, and research scientists for identifying and providing better resiliency and adaptation measures to support states that are most vulnerable to wildfires.
Highlights
Wildfires are crucial for ecosystem dynamics by balancing fuel types and creating appropriate vegetation for maintaining healthy forested regimes [1]
The exposure results indicate that California, Nevada, and Arizona exhibit the highest exposure to wildfires (0.63, 0.52 and 0.49, respectively) while Oklahoma, Florida, and Montana have the least exposure (0.25, 0.21 and 0.19, respectively) (Figure 5a)
The exposure results indicate that California, Nevada, and Arizona these states experience the highest number of wildfires and the largest acres burnt due to wildfires in 2019
Summary
Wildfires are crucial for ecosystem dynamics by balancing fuel types and creating appropriate vegetation for maintaining healthy forested regimes [1]. Despite the integral ecological role of wildfires, uncontrolled burns can cause widespread environmental, economic, social and sustainable development impacts [2,3,4]. Such wildfire impacts include losses to human lives; incurring financial losses from buildings and homes; widespread social, health and economic costs through evacuations, smoke exposure, and loss of tourism revenue [5,6,7]. In order to minimize ignition and spread during this time, California’s electrical utility provider issued rolling blackouts to homes and businesses during high wind and extreme dry conditions This inevitably cost the state billions of dollars in losses [8]. It is evident that wildfires have a direct impact on the livelihood of many residents in fire-prone communities within the United States, making them vulnerable to wildland fire exposure [9]
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