Short- and long-term wildfire threat when adapting infrastructure for wildlife conservation in the boreal forest.

ABSTRACT: Managers designing infrastructure in fire-prone wildland areas require assessments of wildfire threat to quantify uncertainty due to future vegetation and climatic conditions. In this study, we combine wildfire simulation and forest landscape composition modeling to identify areas that would be highly susceptible to wildfire around a proposed conservation corridor in Québec, Canada. In this measure, managers have proposed raising the conductors of a new 735-kV hydroelectric powerline above the forest canopy within a wildlife connectivity corridor to mitigate the impacts to threatened boreal woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus). Retention of coniferous vegetation, however, can increase the likelihood of an intense wildfire damaging powerline infrastructure. To assess the likelihood of high-

SUBMITTER: Dawe DA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9542478 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature