Evaluating the Performance of Fire Rate of Spread Models in Northern-European Calluna vulgaris Heathlands

Abstract

Land-use, climate, and policy changes have impacted the fire regimes of many landscapes across northern Europe. Heathlands in oceanic climates are globally important ecosystems that have experienced an increase in the prevalence of destructive wildfire. Many of these landscapes are also managed using traditional prescribed burning that enhances their structural diversity and agricultural productivity. The changing role of wild and managed fire highlights a necessity to better understand the performance of fire behaviour prediction models for these ecosystems to support sustainable fire risk management. Our research evaluates the outputs of several empirical and quasi-empirical prediction models, as well as their varying software implementations, against observations of fire behaviour. The Rothermel model and its implementations predict rates of spread with similar accuracy to baseline empirical models and provide tolerable estimates of observed fire rate of spread. The generic shrubland empirical model developed by Anderson et al. consistently overpredicts observed rates of spread for prescribed burns in target fuel structures, but its predictions otherwise have a strong correlation with observed spread rate. A range of empirical models and software tools thus appear appropriate to assist managers who wish to evaluate potential fire behaviour and assess risk in heathland landscapes.