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Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

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Re: Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

#121

Post by wswope »

samtho wrote: post #115
wswope wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agreed. I was 100% in the pro-controlled-burn camp until I happened to stumble upon the consequences of rubber hitting the road. A few months back I was visiting family in New Mexico and chatting with some locals. I asked offhandedly about if they did controlled burns out where we were… and boy did I immediately realize it was a sore subject. Last year, the US Forest Service set off the biggest wildfires in t…

This is not a good reason to be anti-controlled burn. You said yourself that this was due to negligence by the USFS. If anything this should highlight the importance of doing controlled burns so that there is minimal chance of these raging infernos cropping up. Rather than blaming the burn, maybe people need to be held responsible instead.

Agreed; I don’t mean to imply I’m firmly against controlled burns now.

I am disenchanted with our current system for executing them in the US, however. Like you say, we need a system for accountability to deal with the externalities.

Re: Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

#124

Post by nordsieck »

hutzlibu wrote: post #118
anoncow wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes a lot of sense. By allowing the teams to fix things quickly and break things, management creates an environment where people can continuously learn how to handle fires and this makes them ready to handle bigger fires and also prevent bigger fires.

There is some middle ground though. I don't want my {critical infrastructure} to "fix things quickly and break things" at a critical moment, where I would have really needed that system. Those things can be scheduled and announced, so I can plan ahead and expect outages at that time.

> There is some middle ground though.

Sure.

But the problem is that there are incentives to keep pushing the middle ground closer towards eventual system collapse.

It's never the right time to see if the backup generators can take the building load. But during real emergencies, it's amazing how common it is for the backup generators to not work for one reason or another.

Re: Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

#125

Post by vkou »

hcurtiss wrote: post #39
jackphilson wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this just generalizes to the recurring problem of individualism vs collectivism. Government regulation is the answer, but it's not being applied efficiently here

I don't think that's it. I think it's more a consequence of democracy versus autocracy. An autocracy could make these trade-offs without political consequence. Of course, autocracies come with other profound challenges. Most I think agree that a benevolent dictator produces the best outcomes. The problem is that human benevolence is fickle, and subject to interpretation -- invariably leading to violence.

Democracies also make these tradeoffs without political consequences, if the people who are subject to the negative externalities are sufficiently disenfranchised, or are simply a powerless minority that we can run over, or are ones whose concerns are sidelined for the benefit of a larger umbrella movement.

I completely agree with the parent poster. This is not a democracy vs autocracy question. This is entirely an individualism[1] versus a collectivism[2] question.

[1] Which prioritizes 'do not actively harm any individual.' [3]

[2] Which prioritizes 'do what is best for the group as a whole.' [3]

[3] While some societies are pretty clearly democratic, and some are pretty clearly autocratic (and some are a mix of both), every society is, to a mixture of degrees, individualistic, and to a mixture of degrees, collectivist. Where they differ is in where the line gets drawn, and on which questions.

Re: Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

#126

Post by grumpy-de-sre »

masklinn wrote: post #11
porkbeer wrote: post #2

Many plants also need fires to repopulate. Its a huge issue.

Unless it’s eucalypts, then they’ll eventually get it don’t you worry.

Australia's revenge for all the invasive species.

Re: Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

#127

Post by m00x »

spicymapotofu wrote: post #114
m00x wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada recently had a "controlled burn" that was made by an international association. They weren't trained on Canadian forests properly, now it's a huge wildfire.

Which was this? The Banff one [may 4] doesn't seem related to this, and if anything seems to defend the practice by example - 31 hectares burned, 28 of which were planned, and only three horse stables were damaged despite weather changing suddenly and spreading the fire.

If you think 24,000 people evacuated and 3 extra hectares burned in an populated area isn't a failure, I don't know what to tell you.

It also caused other fires in the area, which weren't announced since it would make them look bad.

If you look at the wildfire map, it doesn't seem to be noted: https://www.arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/3ffcc2d0ef3e4e0999b0c...

AB governance is terrible right now.

Re: Controlled burns can prevent wildfires; regulations make them nearly impossible

#128

Post by lazide »

ROTMetro wrote: post #92
lazide wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) it’s all good until you’re one of the ‘little people’ 2) succession/plan B is always the problem with dictators/dictatorships. If you’re lucky, the interests of those in power are genuinely aligned with your best interests and they’re competent - (Singapore/PAP, at least historically), but nothing lasts forever.

Don't forget in China these little people have way higher attachment to their homes. They are often ancestral homes. The people that would be happy to be 'forced to move' have already moved to the city in most cases, with only those with high connections to their home remaining. In the USA we don't really have the same sort of attachment to ancestral homes and would be more receptive to paid relocation and view it wa…

At the end of the day, it either happens or it doesn’t - and that has pros and cons either way.

You’re correct on the impact to those folks, but there are also a LOT of other folks who benefit from the new rail (or should, anyway!).

At the end of the day, their strategy works for the majority better.

We’re deadlocked trying to not offend anyone (and get scammed by the contractors in the process). They say ‘fuck it’ and pave it over, and then tuck the little people in a closet and tell them to shut up or else.

But if they didn’t, they’d have no rail where they need to go, like…. us.

Eventually, without some compromise or balance, either system reaches a breaking point. Ours, we’ll eventually be so mired in shit not working that people will leave to somewhere different (if they can) wherever it’s really bad. Think NYC/Detroit/LA/etc. in the 70’s and 80’s.

In China, they crack down too hard (or stay too focused on ‘the plan’) that they destroy what they are trying to preserve/create. Either Violently (Russia), or by going broke/financial crisis (Japan).

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