Fuel Breaks Provide a False Sense of Security
Just building fuel breaks near communities won't solve our wildfire crisis.
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The West is facing another grave fire season because of overgrown forests, beetle infestations, aging brushlands, drought, and record high temperatures. This year could be much worse than 2003, when wildfires in Southern California burned over 750,000 acres and killed 24 people.
Some people think we can solve the fire crisis by cutting dead trees near communities, building fuel breaks, and making firefighting organizations more effective. While this seems like a reasonable approach, it will not solve the problem.
Improving our capacity to fight fires is essential. Cutting dead trees and building strategic fuel breaks are helpful. But the real problem is that our forests are too thick, and our brushlands are old and dying. If we don't reduce the fuel, all our other efforts won't matter.
Fuel breaks make people feel safe without actually making them safe. Most fuel breaks are too narrow to stop a 200-foot tall wall of flame racing across the landscape at 2000 degrees and hurling burning debris as much as a mile. Fuel breaks are only effective if firefighters are on site at the right time and under the right conditions to knock a blaze down. Otherwise, it will race through the fuel break or leap over it, just as we've seen fires easily jump eight-lane highways.
Yet, we spend most taxpayer money - tens of millions of dollars - on fuel breaks. We spend the rest cutting dead trees along roads and near homes without thinning overgrown forests, which stay thick and dangerous.
When the money is gone, most dead and dying trees will stand like matchsticks ready to burn. Even worse, every year, more dead, dry trees will pile up among smaller trees and brush.
Despite the growing threat of wildfire, there are groups that want forests left alone - even preventing homeowners from clearing around houses. Just last month the Sierra Club and its supporters defeated a bill in the California Senate that would have allowed homeowners to clear a mere 300 feet around their homes.
The inescapable truth is that we either manage whole forests or lose whole forests, as well as the communities imbedded in them. So far, even if unintentional, we have chosen to sacrifice our communities and our forests to catastrophic fires because we do not have the will to act on what we know.
So, what is the answer? Centuries of experience and science show that it is surprisingly simple. All we need to do is use historic forests as models for future forests.
The West's historic forests were healthy, most were resistant to large fires. Young, old, and middle-aged trees grew in patches. Frequent low-intensity fires set by lightning and Native peoples kept these forests patchy and well thinned.
We can restore our forests to a condition that resembles their historic grandeur. Such fire-resistant forests also will provide effective and reliable fire protection for modern communities just as they did for Native peoples.
We must construct a limited number of fuel breaks along roads in high-risk areas on the edge of communities as part of an overall safety and restoration plan. This will improve access for firefighters and provide an anchor point for restoration.
Restoration should start at the fuel break as soon as it is constructed, and move into the forest at least one and a half to two miles, farther if possible.
This involves removing beetle-killed trees and thinning live trees to a natural density and patchiness. Native trees should be planted in some openings to rebuild the historic balance in species and ages of trees. Restoration also means leaving selected patches of shrubs and other plants, as well as standing dead trees and logs for wildlife.
Once restored, a forest requires continual maintenance or it will grow out of control and create another catastrophe. This means removing scientifically selected trees and using prescribed fire when and where it is safe.
A restored forest is our first and most effective line of defense against wildfire. A fuel break is the last desperate line of defense against wildfire, and symbolizes our failure as land stewards.
As a fire ecologist and historian of America's forests, the choice seems clear.
We can accept our responsibility, save our communities, and restore the forest heritage we lost through neglect. Or, we can huddle behind fuel breaks and watch torrents of fire incinerate forests, kill people, and lay waste to communities. We must have the courage to make the right choice and work together to protect one another and the forests we share.
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Thomas M. Bonnicksen, Ph.D., is an historian of North American forests and the originator of "restoration forestry." He is professor emeritus of forest science at Texas A&M University, visiting scholar at The Forest Foundation,and author of "America's Ancient Forests" (John Wiley, 2000).