Transitioning from reactive to proactive climate-resilient management strategies, and balancing the potential benefits and risks of wildfires

focus areas and researchers

The Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science is home to several research and education programs designed in anticipation of, and response to, increasingly impactful wildfires. Our research is conducted in close partnership with Indigenous communities, especially in the Okanagan.

Equipped with satellite-connected sensors, 5G network (in partnerships with BC Wildfire Services, the City of Kelowna, and Rogers), and artificial intelligence-assisted cameras, our researchers develop ways to monitor the forest landscape and fire with expansive reach and capacity.

Researchers:

Interdisciplinary research with experts across UBC, including the Centre for Wildfire Coexistence and the Living with Wildfire in the BC Southern Interior Research Excellence Cluster, brings about cutting-edge and nature-based wildfire management solutions for diverse Canadian landscapes. Our works include wildfire imagery, fire valuation and management, wildfire nature–cultures, landscape ecology, ecosystem restoration, and pyrodiversity-biodiversity relationship towards proactive adaptation solutions for resilient ecosystems and communities. Our proactive wildfire strategy includes training programs in wildland fire management including the Canadian Prescribed Fire Training program.

Researchers:

  • Jen Baron, Assistant Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • Mathieu Bourbonnais, Assistant Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • Kevin Hanna, Associate Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • Crystal Kolden, Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • Lael Parrott, Professor | Biology & Earth and Environmental Sciences

We develop innovative and robust modelling strategies and tools and reflect the new reality of wildfire and support decision making by fire agencies and communities. Our researchers are key members of the US-Canada’s Global Centre on Climate-Resilient Western Interconnected Grid, which aims to develop grid resilience for one of North America’s two major power grids in the face of intensifying wildfire.

Researchers:

  • Jen Baron, Assistant Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • W. John Braun, Professor | Mathematics, Physics and Statistics
  • Kevin Hanna, Associate Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • Crystal Kolden, Professor | Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • John R.J. Thompson, Assistant Professor | Mathematics, Physics and Statistics

We develop predictive framework for proactive biodiversity conservation strategies in the face of climate change with strong focuses on prescribed burning and post-fire salvage logging. Our works investigate the resilience of wild populations (plants, animals, and microbes) to changing conditions towards solutions in conservation, and wildfire-resilient landscape restoration and development.

Researchers:

We mitigate the impact of wildfire on crops by developing smoke protection strategies for grapevine and sustainable agricultural practices by combining data science, chemistry, genomics, and microbiology. The Centre for Wildfire Coexistence, the Centre for Environmental Assessment Research, and the Living with Wildfire in the BC Southern Interior Research Excellence Cluster also focus on identifying solutions for resilient communities in anticipation of wildfires and other destructive environmental events.

Researchers:

Centre for Wildfire Coexistence

Revolutionizing Wildfire Preparedness in BC

The Centre for Wildfire Coexistence (CWC) responds to an escalating need to proactively adapt forestry and land management practices with the aim of restoring healthy and resilient forests, as communities adapt to a changing climate.

CWC WEBSITE

Wildfire programs

Get involved with climate-change resilience and wildfire research through related UBCO programs.

Wildland fire landscape shot with a focus on a tree on fire in the foreground.

Earth and Environmental Sciences

Fundamentals of Wildland Fire Ecology and Management

Presented from both Indigenous and western perspectives, this program combines knowledge of western fire science and Indigenous ways of knowing with landscape and fire ecology and social sciences.

Learn more & Register

Earth and Environmental Sciences

Training for Canadian Prescribed Fire Practitioners

These non-credit courses will be delivered through a decentralized, national training model ensuring the training reflects regional realities. The curriculum will be developed over the next couple years by a team with deep experience in prescribed fire, wildfire management and applied fire science.

Courses will be available for registration through UBC Continuing and Professional Education.

LEARN MORE ABOUT PROGRAM development

Undergrad science programs

Access enriching experiential learning opportunities.

Graduate science programs

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All degrees and programs

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UBCO Research highlights

Learn how UBC Okanagan researchers are pursuing climate-change resilience and wildfire research and the far reaching impacts of their findings.

Why some creeks run stronger after wildfire—and why it doesn’t last

AI-powered vision gives meaning to wildfire chaos

A Husky A300 rugged mobile robot unit works it's way over a forest floor and tree debris

Robotics, AI advancing wildfire, agricultural research at UBCO

 

Advanced wildfire research could save billions, protect vital power supply

An aerial view of the Bonaparte River (Kluhtows to the Shuswap people) floodplain.

UBCO researcher examines how wildfires can transform rivers

A landscape shot of a mountain on fire in the background, while people are in the foreground watching the fire from across the lake. The fire illuminates the night red and transforms it into shades of red and orange.

Learning to live with wildfire

A vineyard with a Forest Fire burning on the mountain beyond it in West Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada.

Testing for smoke taint in Okanagan wines

A man sprays water on flames in a fiery forest
Catching fire: BC wildfires are bigger, hotter and more consequential than ever

Fire burning on a hillside

Living with wildfire

Scientists say current wildfire situation is beyond a ‘crisis’

In the media

Our wildfire research expertise is featured by some of the world’s largest and most-trusted media.