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Fire Workgroup

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Collaborative Wiki Main Page

Inventory Collaborative Google Drive Link

Members

Co-leads: Jeff Vukovich (USEPA), Tom Moore (WRAP)

Tesh Rao (USEPA), Ariel Holway-Jones (Alabama DEM), Carlos Mancilla (New York DEC), Cindy Hollenberg (New Mexico), Di Tian (GADNR), Tao Zeng (GADNR), Doug Boyer (TCEQ), Greg Mortensen (Utah), Jayson Prentice (Kansas), Nicholle Worland (NJ DEP), Randy Strait (NC DENR), Rebecca Simpson (Colorado), Rhonda Payne (Montana), Rob Leteff (Wyoming), Sylvia Vanderspek (CARB), Vanessa Crandell-Beck (Alaska), Farren Herron-Thorpe (Washington ECY), Gail Tonnesen (USEPA), Debbie Miller (National Park Service), Lance Avey (USEPA), Joel Karmazyn (Utah), Klaus Scott (CARB), Kevin Briggs (Colorado), Trent Wickman (US Forest Service), Mary Fauci, (Nez Perce Tribe), Matt Mavko (Air Sciences), Rebecca Matichuk (USEPA), Will Stone(USEPA)

Coordination Committee Meetings

April 5, 2018

Attendees

Co-leads: Jeff Vukovich (USEPA), Tom Moore (WRAP)

Agenda

  • State review/feedback/plans thus far (brief summary)

  • Next call: Thursday May 3rd at 1PM ET

Minutes/Notes

  • Roll call completed
  • Briefly went over Action Items from minutes from March call
  • Vukovich went over Fire Classification overview for Ag, Grassland and Rx fires (see presentation in Agenda)
    • CARB mentioned that finding the ICS-209 reports on the FAMWEB site can be challenging
      • Presentation has link to ICS-209 reports for others to download
    • Concerns about lack of Federal land fire info were mentioned
  • State feedback discussion
    • Washington state
      • Has reviewed Grassland/Pasture fires and have concern with CDL database in some cases
      • Will be moving some Rx fires to Ag burn category for 2016
      • Suggested the use of a national and state park lands shapefile for further QA of ag/grassland detects and perhaps it has other uses
      • In 2014 analysis, Ag burns were underestimated in NEI2014 by factor of 3; did submit some burn data to nonpoint sector for NEI2014
    • Idaho mentioned that they will likely be submitting ag burn data for 2016
      • data will be day-specific with latitude-longitude information
      • Vukovich mentioned some of the possible drawbacks of submitting county data on annual temporal resolution
      • If states can submit data on monthly temporal resolution that would be good too, but day-specific and lat-lon info the best case
    • Georgia
      • Will be submitting their own fire inventory for year 2016
      • Includes wildfire and prescribed fire emissions (smoldering and flaming separated), acres burned and heat flux info and ag detect info
      • Will compare their 2016 inventory vs. 2016 alpha
      • Georgia willing to share NEI2014 document on their inventory generation process; will post to Google Drive
      • Asked whether HAPs emissions needed
          • Tom Moore mentioned that overall 2016 Collaborative WG leaders have indicated that HAPs is desired for beta version
    • North Carolina
      • Rx acres burned much higher in 2016 alpha inventory vs. NC fire databases; see presentation
      • Showed Fort Bragg case study and plan to submit better activity data for year 2016
  • USFS (Wickman) mentioned that Federal lands fire database helps with improving fire inventories
    • Workgroup will include workign on getting access to these databases as part of discussions with AIRFIRE team
    • NCDAQ mentioned they tried to access this Federal database unsuccessfully
  • Daily and Event-based emissions reports now available; see agenda for links or goto QA folder on Google Drive
    • If more QA reports needed, please let co-leads know
  • Punchlist or wish list of desired updates for beta version discussed
    • a Google doc will be started with all in the group encourage to add to the list now and in the future
  • Temporal and Speciation profile presentation moved to next month
  • Charge document closure needed
    • Send all comments on the charge document to co-leads by Friday April 13
  • Next call is May 3rd 1PM ET

Action Items

  • Ag burn QA reports generated for WG (Vukovich)
  • Continued to communicate with AIRFIRE team about assistance regarding BSky modules and input data (Co-leads and Rao)
  • State continue to review alpha inventory and report findings (ALL)
  • Start punchlist/wishlist document for improvements to beta version (Vukovich)
  • Finalized Workgroup charge document by Friday April 13(ALL)
  • Inquire about need for HAPs in beta version (Co-leads)
  • Investigate use of a national/state park lands shapefile for QA of alpha inventory (EPA, WA)

March 1, 2018

Attendees

Co-leads: Jeff Vukovich (USEPA), Tom Moore (WRAP)

Tesh Rao (USEPA), Carlos Mancilla (New York DEC), Cindy Hollenberg (New Mexico), Di Tian (GADNR), Tao Zeng (GADNR),Jayson Prentice (Kansas), Nicholle Worland (NJ DEP), Randy Strait (NC DENR), Rebecca Simpson (Colorado), Rhonda Payne (Montana), Rob Leteff (Wyoming), Vanessa Crandell-Beck (Alaska), Farren Herron-Thorpe (Washington ECY),Lance Avey (USEPA), Joel Karmazyn (Utah), Klaus Scott (CARB), Kevin Briggs (Colorado), Trent Wickman (US Forest Service), Mary Fauci, (Nez Perce Tribe), Rebecca Matichuk (USEPA), Will Stone(USEPA), Josh Hall (USFS), Mark Fitch (USNPS), Mike Barna(USNPS), Frank Forsgren(NV),Coleen Campbell(CO), Mary Uhl(WESTAR),Sarah Strachan (ID), Will Stone(USEPA),

Agenda

  • Introductions, roll call – name, daily job responsibilities with respect to fire and smoke issues, agency
    • set up regular meeting times for workgroup
      • suggest first Thursday of month at 1PM ET (like today)
      • build agenda for monthly calls based on a 60-min. duration

Minutes/Notes

  • Roll call taken and members given opportunity to briefly explain their daily job activities as it relates to fire inventories/modeling
  • Group will have a call once a month on first Thursday at 1PM ET
  • Overall Collaboration mission was described and wiki pages introduced for more information
  • Reviewed Draft Fires Workgroup charge document
  • Introduced the Fire Workgroup wiki webpage and Google Drive folder
  • Briefly covered the Wildland fires tech memo for the Alpha version of the 2016 fire inventory
    • Question by Farren Herron-Thorpe: Will this workgroup work on international fire inventories as well? (Canada and Mexico)
    • Klaus Scott mentioned that CARB may have plans to QA the ag burns and prescribed fires in CA
    • Trent Wickman: would like to compare 2011 and 2014 prescribed fires vs. the alpha version 2016 fires especially for Midwest region
    • Group should consider including pile burns in future versions if possible
  • Other QA products already available were introduced/shared
    • Concern on how much time workgroup members have to QA fires
    • List of information about top fires in nation for 2016 needed
  • Brief discussion on emissions modeling platform issues (speciation, hourly profile, plume-rise)

Action Items

  • All possible workgroup members review Draft Fire Workgroup Charge document (dated March 1, 2018)
  • All possible workgroup members review Wildland fires technical memo for Alpha version of 2016 fire inventory (dated Feb 22, 2018)
  • All possible workgroup members review the QA products/maps for the alpha version of the fire inventory (in QA folder on Google Drive)
  • All possible workgroup members review the alpha version fire inventory in SMOKE format
  • All workgroup members provided a list of desired QA products for fire inventories/model platform development
  • Develop list of information (emissions, acres-burned) of top fires in nation in 2016 from alpha version of inventory (USEPA, Vukovich)
  • Contact and invite AIRFIRE team to provide more information on how to obtain Bluesky module updates during future workgroup call (USEPA, Rao and Vukovich)
  • Develop technical memo describing the current approach for handling fire emissions modeling temporal, speciation and vertical allocation issues at EPA (USEPA, Vukovich)

  • Agenda items for future calls
    • Closure on Charge doc
    • Milestones for Fire Workgroup
    • “stable” modules and complete activity data for using BlueSky framework to prepare historic and future projection fire EIs
    • Discussion on how to define scope and desired improvements for beta version of 2016 fire inventory
    • Key parameterizations of fire activity data (consumption, fuel loadings, acres and piles, plume rise, speciation profiles, others)
    • Estimating future fire emissions to bound air quality planning projections

Next Call: April 5, 2018 1PM ET