Assessing peatland fire vulnerability following fuel reduction: A moss ecohydrology approach

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Peatlands cover ~17% of Canada's land surface and are located primarily in the boreal and subarctic ecozones. Peatland ecosystems represent a global climate regulator and a regionally important water resource, containing one-third of the global soil carbon pool and accounting for 10% of the global surface fresh water. While field evidence suggests that peatlands are generally resilient to wildfire our recent research indicates that climate and land-use change can result in extreme deep burning in these ecosystems. Deep burning releases large amounts of CO2 to the atmosphere, reduces air quality and can cause the peatland to undergo an ecosystem regime shift. Peat fires in Russia in 2010 resulted in over 3000 deaths due to poor air quality and peat fires in Alberta in 2011 impacted public and resource sector infrastructure causing a drop in National GDP. Moreover, deep burning and smouldering is costly for fire management teams to suppress and can create safety issues for firefighters. In order to reduce these threats and risks a fuel reduction program has been established by FP Innovations to remove trees through mulching. While FP Innovations has demonstrated that this process reduces fire risk in upland ecosystems the vulnerability in peatland (lowland) ecosystems remains unknown. Given that the company lacks the expertise on wildfire hydrology and dynamics in ecosystems with thick organic soils, the aim of this research is quantify the burn severity of a fuels-treated (mulched) peatland following a prescribed burn in central Alberta in September, 2015. FP Innovations will facilitate both the fuels reduction and the prescribed burn. We will parameterize the Peat Smouldering and Ignition (PSI) model using field measurements to determine the controls of various moss species on burn severity and how this is impacted by mulching. Our research will provide FP Innovations with new information, enhanced models, guidelines, and recommendations that will help their industry better understand the long-term ecological and hydrological ramifications of natural resource management (forest fires, peat resources) decisions and responses to both climate and land-use change in peatlands.