Value of Weather Observations for Reduction of Forest Fire Impact on Population

* Corresponding author. ** This research was performed in the framework of the EC project GEO-BENE (www.geo-bene.eu), led by IIASA. Abstract – In this paper we investigate how improvements in the weather observation systems help to reduce forest fires impact on population by targeting and monitoring places where ripe fires are likely to occur. For the purposes of population impact assessment we suggest a relevant index. In our model the air patrolling schedule is determined by the Nesterov index, which is calculated from observed weather data sets at different spatial resolutions. The reduction of fire impact on population, associated with utilization of finer grid, indicates the benefits of more precise weather observations. We also explore the sensitivity of the forest fires model with respect to the quality of input data while taking into account the multitude of sources providing weather observations. Our model shows that approximately 90% of the feasible reduction of fire impact on population can be achieved by refining weather observations in 30% of the area of interest.