Over the holiday weekend I met a woman who works for forest service in Nevada City, California. We got to chatting about fire risk, as one does.
She noted that her county -- like every other California county -- is still approving new homes in areas ...
She noted that her county -- like every other California county -- is still approving new homes in areas ...
the forest service is very, very sure will burn, and that those new homes make it increasingly impossible to manage the forest for future fires:
To manage fire, you have to burn the forest. But if you put homes there, you can't. It's already nearly physically impossible ...
To manage fire, you have to burn the forest. But if you put homes there, you can't. It's already nearly physically impossible ...
... to treat California's forests, due to the extreme slopes and remoteness of most forest lands. Sprinkle them with homes and humans, and just about all you can do is sit back and pray.
And worse: The non-burn methods needed to treat high-risk forests -- mechanical thinning ...
And worse: The non-burn methods needed to treat high-risk forests -- mechanical thinning ...
... or even aerial salvage logging? Mostly illegal, opposed by NIMBYs and enviros. But the kicker:
When we shut down the West Coast's logging industry to preserve old growth, we wiped out almost the entire labor pool of people qualified to thin fire-prone forest before it burns.
When we shut down the West Coast's logging industry to preserve old growth, we wiped out almost the entire labor pool of people qualified to thin fire-prone forest before it burns.
And even if we *did* have that labor pool, the added complexity of working around fire sprawl -- and the anti-logging politics of the people who live there now -- would make it near impossible.
The upshot of our ~ hour long rambling convesation by the river:
The upshot of our ~ hour long rambling convesation by the river:
The fire, climate, resilience, insurance/risk professionals who work on trying to prevent even worse climate catastrophes in California are stunned by degree of cultivated ignorance of both citizens & elected officials.
It is *so much worse* than what people are talking about.
It is *so much worse* than what people are talking about.
"Oh we can just adjust our insurance rules and it will be fine" folks if you wait until the insurance industry is collapsing in free-fall around you, you are decades late in getting the memo about your insane, carbrained, climate-denying land use policies.
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