Abstract
Vegetation often fuels fires. We describe both vegetation fuels and how fires burn with specific terms central to understanding fire science and management. Fuel type, amount (load), and structure mediate both the effects of fire on ecosystems and human impacts on fires. Independent of its biological nature, characterizing how readily vegetation could burn as fuels is required to describe and model fire behavior and fire effects for multiple fire science and management applications. Fire behavior terms apply to either flaming and smoldering combustion, except when preceded by a qualifier. Our book, Fire Science: From Chemistry to Landscape Management, offers a logical progression of combustion to vegetation dynamics. In this and other chapters, visually compelling examples bring key concepts to life. This chapter builds on the previous chapters focused on the chemistry of ignition and combustion, and sets up the following chapters on fire effects on people and ecosystems, then managing fuels and fires in a dynamic and changing world.
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Castro Rego, F., Morgan, P., Fernandes, P., Hoffman, C. (2021). Fuel and Fire Behavior Description. In: Fire Science. Springer Textbooks in Earth Sciences, Geography and Environment. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-69815-7_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-69815-7_6
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