An optimization approach to prescribed burning for mitigating PM emissions in wildfire management.

Prescribed burning effectively reduces wildfire hazards through its use in managing forest fuel loads. However, its broad application often overlooks the health and environmental impacts of PM emissions, which can result in significant costs. While it mitigates wildfire emissions, prescribed burning also generates PM, particularly during the smoldering phase, with these fine particles posing serious respiratory and cardiovascular health risks. This study aims to analyze the impact of prescribed burning PM emissions, focusing on strategic planning to minimize total net fires PM emission costs. Specifically, we developed an optimization model that quantifies both the implementation costs of prescribed burning and the social costs of PM emissions from prescribed burning and wildfires. Applying this model to Oregon in 2021, we demonstrated that prescribed burning can effectively reduce wildfire emissions and the associated social costs by 65.30%, with an estimated benefit-cost ratio of 4.35. The total net cost can be reduced by 25.68% at the optimal prescribed burning extent, requiring a 15.65% increase in acreage compared to the actual implementation. However, our case study also showed that exceeding this optimal extent significantly raises net costs due to the social costs of elevated PM emissions from prescribed burning. Over-implementation leads to a proportional increase in adverse health outcomes, ultimately outweighing the benefits. Our study underscores the influence of prescribed burning strategies on PM emission, emphasizing the critical need to integrate emission assessments into fire management planning.