Method of Wildfire Risk Assessment in Consideration of Land-Use Types: A Case Study in Central China

Abstract

Research on wildfire risk can quantitatively assess the risk of wildfire damage to the population, economy, and natural ecology. However, existing research has primarily assessed the spatial risk of wildfires across an entire region, neglecting the impact of different land-use types on the assessment outcomes. The purpose of the study is to construct a framework for assessing wildfire risk in different land-use types, aiming to comprehensively assess the risk of wildfire disasters in a region. We conducted a case study in Central China, collecting and classifying historical wildfire samples according to land-use types. The Light Gradient Boosting Machine (LGBM) was employed to construct wildfire susceptibility models for both overall and individual land-use types. Additionally, a subjective and objective combined weighting method using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Entropy Weight Method (EWM) was utilized to build the wildfire vulnerability model. By integrating susceptibility and vulnerability information, we comprehensively assessed the combined risk of wildfire disasters across land-use types. The results demonstrate the following: (1) Assessing wildfire susceptibility based on different land-use types compensated for limitations in analyzing overall wildfire susceptibility, with a higher prediction performance and more detailed susceptibility information. (2) Significant variations in wildfire susceptibility distribution existed among different land-use types, with varying contributions of factors. (3) Using the AHP-EWM combined weighting method effectively addressed limitations of a single method in determining vulnerability. (4) Land-use types exerted a significant impact on wildfire risk assessment in Central China. Assessing wildfire risk for both overall and individual land-use types enhances understanding of spatial risk distribution and specific land use risk. The experimental results validate the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed evaluation framework, providing guidance for wildfire prevention and control.