Forest Fires: Why The Large Year-to-Year Variation in Forests Burned?

Jerome Apt, Dennis Epple and Fallaw Sowell

No 31738, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: Quantifying factors giving rise to temporal variation in forest fires is important for advancing scientific understanding and improving fire prevention. We demonstrate that eighty percent of the large year-to-year variation in forest area burned in California can be accounted for by variation in temperature, precipitation, housing construction, electricity transmission, and ocean surface temperatures in the North Atlantic, North Pacific, and Equatorial Pacific. California is of particular interest because of its large acreage burned and proximity of fires to human populations. We believe our model is the first unified treatment of climatic factors and human activities that affect forest area burned.

JEL-codes: Q23 Q53 Q54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023-09
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Working Paper: Forest Fires: Why the Large Year-to-Year Variation in Forests Burned? (2023)
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