The objective of this study was to provide managers with national-level data on current conditions of vegetation and fuels developed from ecologically based methods to address these questions: How do current vegetation and fuels differ from those that existed historically? Where on the landscape do vegetation and fuels differ from historical levels? In particular, where are high fuel accumulations? When considered at a coarse scale, which areas estimated to have high fuel accumulations represent the highest priorities for treatment?

A technical discussion of the implementation & development of models & data systems used to manage the air quality impacts of wildland & prescribed fires. Strategies & priorities in the plan were generated by the Express Team & a diverse group of 86 subject matter experts who attended a national planning workshop. This plan provides a conceptual design as a first step toward balancing the goals of land managers who use fire to manage ecosystems, & air resource managers who aim to reduce the impacts of fires on air quality. Recommends nine strategies as a synthesis of internal discussions, & review comments.

The Landscape Fire and Resource Management Planning Tools Prototype Project, or LANDFIRE Prototype Project, began in April of 2002 and ended in April of 2005. The project was funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service and U.S. Department of the Interior. The objectives of the LANDFIRE Prototype Project were to develop the methods, tools, and protocols for producing consistent and comprehensive digital maps of current vegetation composition and structure, wildland fuel, historical fire regimes, and fire regime condition class (FRCC) to be applied across the entire United States at a 30-meter spatial resolution. The LANDFIRE Prototype Project was conducted in two large study areas: the first in the highlands of central Utah and the second in the northern Rocky Mountains of Idaho and Montana. The LANDFIRE Prototype Project involved the compilation of a large field-referenced database to serve as training data for developing predictive landscape models; the development of Landsat image catalogs and biophysical gradient layers to serve as spatial predictors for mapping vegetation and wildland fuel characteristics; the development of vegetation and fuel map unit classifications; the development of a suite of vegetation dynamics models for simulating vegetation development over time; the implementation of a landscape succession model (LANDSUMv4) for simulating historical fire regimes and vegetation reference conditions; and the development of maps of surface and canopy fuel and fire effects fuel models for application in wildland fire management planning. This report describes the scientific foundations of LANDFIRE and provides details on the methods and results of the LANDFIRE Prototype Project.

Decades of fire suppression, as well as changing land management practices, have caused vegetation to accumulate and become altered on federal lands. Concerns about the effects of wildland fires have increased efforts to reduce fuels on federal lands. These efforts also have environmental effects. The requesters asked GAO to (1) describe effects from fires on the environment, (2) assess the information gathered by the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on such effects, and (3) assess the agencies approaches to environmental risks associated with reducing fuels. This report recommends that the Secretaries of Agriculture and the Interior (1) develop a plan to implement the agencies monitoring framework, (2) develop guidance that formalizes the assessment of landscape-level risks to ecosystems, and (3) clarify existing guidance, working with the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), to assess the risks of environmental effects from reducing fuels.