More smoke today for less smoke tomorrow? We need to better understand the public health benefits and costs of prescribed fire

被引:12
作者
Jones, Benjamin A. [1 ]
McDermott, Shana [2 ]
Champ, Patricia A. [3 ]
Berrens, Robert P. [1 ]
机构
[1] Univ New Mexico, Dept Econ, 1 Univ New Mexico,MSC 05 3060, Albuquerque, NM 87131 USA
[2] Trinity Univ, Dept Econ, One Trinity Pl, San Antonio, TX 78212 USA
[3] US Forest Serv, Rocky Mt Res Stn, Ft Collins, CO 80526 USA
关键词
benefits of prescribed fire; benefits-costs; human health; knowledge gaps; prescribed fire; public acceptability; smoke; wildfire; wildfire management; SOCIAL ACCEPTABILITY; WILDLAND; MANAGEMENT; WILDFIRE; LIABILITY; IMPACTS; BURN;
D O I
10.1071/WF22025
中图分类号
S7 [林业];
学科分类号
0829 ; 0907 ;
摘要
Rapidly scaling up the use of prescribed fire is being promoted as an important pathway for reducing the growing damages of wildfire events in the United States, including limiting the health impacts from smoke emissions. However, we do not currently have the science needed to understand how the health impacts associated with prescribed fire smoke in the present compare to wildfire smoke exposure in the future. In particular, we lack an understanding of how the potential long-term public health benefits of prescribed fire on future wildfire smoke and health impacts compare to prescribed fire's short-term effects on human health. Answering the question 'How do we learn to sustainably coexist with wildfire?' requires a new research agenda investigating the magnitudes and distribution of the health benefits and costs associated with prescribed burning. We suggest three areas for a new research agenda: (1) improved understanding of the health costs of prescribed fire; (2) quantification of the expected health benefits of prescribed fire through possible decreased future wildfire smoke emissions; and (3) better knowledge on the distributional impacts of prescribed fire smoke. We conclude that we need to first learn to sustainably coexist with prescribed fire in order to sustainably coexist with wildfire.
引用
收藏
页码:918 / 926
页数:9
相关论文
共 54 条