IIASA-OeAW lecture: research and prevention of forest fires

Forest fires cause millions of dollars in damage every year and due to the expected increase in dry periods and heat waves due to climate change, an increased occurrence of forest fires is to be expected in the future. Preventive measures make sense in areas that are already at risk today, or in regions where there may be an increased risk of forest fires due to changing environmental conditions. Research is committed to a better understanding of the causes of the emergence and spread of forest fires and to develop the basis for assessing the hazard, exposure and vulnerability of forests in order to assess forest fire risk.

In the Alpine country of Austria, hardly any attention was paid to forest fire documentation, forest fire research and forest fire management until a few years ago. With the Austrian Forest Fire Research Initiative (AFFRI), first steps have been taken to close the existing knowledge gaps. The research recommends an integrated forest fire management that understands the drivers of the current and future fire regime in mountain forests, takes into account the needs of people living in the Alpine region and aims to minimise the negative effects of fires. The elements of such forest fire management will be illustrated in the lecture using examples of prevention measures.