Fuels Planning: Science Synthesis and

Integration

Economic Uses Fact Sheet: 6

Selection Criteria Analysis

United States

Department

of Agriculture

Forest Service

Rocky Mountain

Research Station

Research Note

RMRS-RN-20-6-WWW

September 2004

Economics Team Co-Leads:

Roger Fight

Jamie Barbour

USDA Forest Service

Pacific Northwest Research Station

620 SW Main Street, Suite 400

Portland, OR 97205

Fuels planning: Science synthesis and integration, an interagency research/management partnership to support the Ten-Year

Fire Plan, led by Russell T. Graham, RMRS,

and Sarah M. McCaffrey, NCRS.

Synthesizing

Scientific Information

for Fire and Fuels

Project Managers

Pacific Northwest

Research Station

What Are Other Managers Doing?

The information for this

fact sheet was provided by

Geof Donovan at the

Portland Forestry Sciences

Laboratory, USDA.

Confidence in decisionmaking can

often come from knowing if others in similar circumstances would

choose the same management

strategy. Given particular conditions, have other fuel planners applied mechanical or prescribed fire

treatments? Researchers at the

Pacific Northwest (PNW) Research Station (USDA Forest Service) and the University of Saskatchewan have developed a Selection Criteria Analysis for answering this very

question. Selection Criteria Analysis does not necessarily indicate which treatment

type is best for your particular situation. Rather, the analysis provides useful insights about what variables have influenced other managers in their selection of

treatment type based on a number of site-specific characteristics and management

objectives.

The information for the analysis comes from the FASTRACS (Fuel Analysis, Smoke

Tracking, and Report Access Computer System) program of the Pacific Northwest Region of the USDA Forest Service, drawing on cases from Oregon and

Washington during 2000 to 2002óafter implementation of the National Fire Plan.

As in all decisionmaking, the choice of management activity should reflect the

unique factors of your situation. The more similar your site is to those from the

FASTRACS database, the more relevant the comparison will be.

Factors Affecting Choice of Treatment

The fire regime, topography, and management objective are all factors that significantly affect the likelihood that managers use prescribed fire or mechanical treatments. In many cases the decision of whether or not to use fire may be obviousó

on steep slopes in high-severity fire regimes, for example. But what if the answer

is not so obvious, and different factors point toward the use of conflicting strategies? The Selection Criteria Analysis provides useful information about how these

factors weigh into previous manager decisions.

• Site characteristics: The use of prescribed fire is typically less common in

fire regime IIógrass and mountain shrub communities having frequent,

stand-replacing firesóthan in fire regimes I and III. Prescribed fire is used

less frequently in moist forest types having low-frequency, high-severity fire

regimes. Slope and elevation are important variables for selecting treatment

type. Fire is less likely to be used at high elevations and on steeper slopes.
The Fuels Planning fact sheets are based on preliminary findings. Information from fact sheets will be synthesized in an upcoming publication.

Economics Team Fact Sheets

Look for fact sheet topics from the Economics Team including prescribed

fire costs, harvesting, log hauling, NEPA and other regulations, wood utilization, economic impacts on communities, markets for wood, and harvest equipment requirements.

Fuels Planning: Synthesis and Integration

This fact sheet is one in a series being produced as part of a larger project

supported by the USDA Forest Service to synthesize new knowledge and

information relevant to fire and fuels management. Fact sheets address

topics related to stand structure, environmental impacts, economics, and

human responses to these factors. Information in the fact sheets is targeted for the dry forests of the Inland West, but is often applicable across

broad regions of the country. For more information, please visit our Web

site at:

www.fs.fed.us/fire/tech_transfer/synthesis/synthesis_index

Prescribed fire is more difficult to contain on

steeper slopes, while conditions at higher elevation

sites may be less conducive to prescribed burning

due to longer fire return intervals and the resulting

increased risk of crown fires.

• Management objective: According to cases in

the FASTRACS database, prescribed fire is more

likely to be used when management goals are to

achieve defensible space objectives, fuel reduction

objectives, and municipal watershed objectives;

whereas mechanical treatments are more likely to

be used for watershed improvement objectives. It

is important to remember that Selection Criteria

Analysis does not indicate which strategies are

optimal for each management objective; rather, the

analysis indicates which treatment managers have

chosen in past situations.

Balancing the Factors

In some cases, the management decision is clear. In many

cases, however, the above factors can point toward the

use of opposing strategies. For example, what method

have other managers chosen when their sites are relatively

flat and low elevation (pointing toward the use of prescribed fire) but the management objective is watershed

improvement (pointing toward the past use of mechanical treatments)? Selection Criteria Analysis weighs the individual factors to provide insights on past decisions by

managers.

Selected References

Cleaves, David A.; Brodie, J. Douglas. 1990. Economic

analysis of prescribed burning. Pp. 271ñ 282 in Natural

and prescribed fire in Pacific Northwest forests, J. D.

Walstad and others, eds. Oregon State University Press,

Corvallis, OR.

Cleaves, David A.; Haines, Terr K.; Martinez, Jorge. 1999.

Prescribed burning costs: trends and influences in the

National Forest System. P. 227 in Proceedings of the symposium on fire economics, planning and policy: bottom lines. USDA Forest Service Gen. Tech. Rep. PSWGTR-173.

Rideout, Douglas B.; Omi, Philip N. 1995. Estimating the cost of fuels treatment. Forest Science 41(4):

664ñ674.

USDA/USDI. 1995. Federal wildland fire management

policy and program review report. U.S. Department of

the Interior, U.S. Department of Agriculture. Washington, DC. 41p.