Large areas of plantation in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia were burnt during the devastating 2019/20 Black Summer bushfires. Under changing climate projections, plantations in Australia are expected to be exposed to increases in the length and severity of fire seasons. Understanding changes in fire regimes and in associated impacts in plantation landscapes will be key to adequately managing the associated risks to both plantation and community assets in coming decades. This understanding requires improved quantification of plantation fuel profiles as well as modelling of complex interactions and processes at landscape-scales, encompassing a range of potential conditions including dynamic interactions between changing climates and fire regimes, and feasible management strategies for managing fire-related risks to multiple assets.
Encompassing multiple plantation landscapes across Australia, this study sought to:
1. Develop region-specific models for predicting plantation fuel structure and fire behaviour;
2. Quantify fire risks to plantations and nearby community assets under current and changing climates; and
3. Evaluate the effectiveness of management options for mitigating some of these risks under changing climates.
This research included the customisation of a fire simulation tool (PHOENIX RapidFire) for use in plantation landscapes by developing plantation-specific fuel functions (derived from field-sampling in hardwood and softwood plantations across Australia) that were integrated into fire spread models. To quantify longer-term risks, these advancements were also integrated into a stochastic fire regime simulator (FROST– Fire Regimes and Operation Simulation Tool). Fire risks to both environmental and community assets were evaluated under current and changing climates to support evidence-based management to help guide investment, insurance negotiations, and fire mitigation in the plantation sector. The fire regime simulator (FROST) was also used to evaluate a range of different management options for reducing risk as a basis for efficient allocation of fire prevention and response resources both by plantation growers and by broader fire management agencies.
The project encompassed six case study landscapes (each roughly 80 by 80 km; Figure 1) within five plantation regions across Australia (southwest Western Australia; the Green Triangle – capturing southeastern South Australia and western Victoria; southeastern New South Wales Tumut region; southeast Queensland (SEQ); and northeast Tasmania).
Project number: VNC518-1920
