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Climate change and wildfire risk in an expanding wildland–urban interface: a case study from the Colorado Front Range Corridor

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Abstract

Context

Wildfire is a particular concern in the wildland–urban interface (WUI) of the western United States where human development occurs close to flammable natural vegetation.

Objectives

(1) Assess the relative influences of WUI expansion versus climate-driven fire regime change on spatial and temporal patterns of burned WUI, and (2) determine whether WUI developed in the future will have higher or lower wildfire risk than existing WUI.

Methods

We projected the spatial pattern of the WUI and its associated wildfire risk from 2005 to 2050 at 90-m spatial resolution and 5-year intervals in Colorado Front Range using CHANGE, a landscape change model that simulates land cover and land use change, natural vegetation dynamics, and wildfire in a unified framework. A total of four scenarios from a factorial design with static versus changing WUI and static versus changing fire regimes were simulated to examine the effects of WUI expansion and climate-driven fire regime change on burned area in the WUI.

Results

Both WUI expansion and fire regime change contributed to the increase of burned WUI, but fire regime change had a stronger influence. The effects of WUI expansion and fire regime change had a combined influence greater than the sum of their individual effects. This interaction was a result of projected WUI expansion into regions of higher wildfire risk than existing WUI.

Conclusions

The human footprint will continue to expand into wildland areas and must be considered along with climate effects when assessing the impacts of changing fire regimes in future landscapes.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Tamara Wilson for providing helpful comments on an earlier version of this manuscript. Financial support for this work was provided through Research Work Order Number G12AC20295 from the USGS. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Geospatial Sciences Center of Excellence, South Dakota State University, Brookings, SD, 57007, USA

    Zhihua Liu, Michael C. Wimberly & Aashis Lamsal

  2. U.S. Geological Survey, Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center, Sioux Falls, SD, 57198, USA

    Terry L. Sohl

  3. U.S. Geological Survey, Geosciences and Environmental Change Science Center, Denver, CO, 80225, USA

    Todd J. Hawbaker

Authors
  1. Zhihua Liu
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  2. Michael C. Wimberly
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  5. Todd J. Hawbaker
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Correspondence to Zhihua Liu.

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Liu, Z., Wimberly, M.C., Lamsal, A. et al. Climate change and wildfire risk in an expanding wildland–urban interface: a case study from the Colorado Front Range Corridor. Landscape Ecol 30, 1943–1957 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-015-0222-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-015-0222-4

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