Power agency that destroyed Pacific Northwest wildfire evidence ‘completely rewrites’ mitigation plan for 2026

The Pacific Northwest’s federal power agency, recently found guilty of destroying evidence that may have tied it to a disastrous 2020 wildfire, has released its latest fire mitigation plan.

The Bonneville Power Administration released this year’s updated plan on Wednesday, with officials saying the plan had been “completely rewritten” to elevate the agency’s risk modeling improvements and operational changes. The agency was created by Congress in 1937 to deliver power from federally owned hydroelectric dam projects to the region. The 2026 plan is the fifth iteration since 2020.

The 2026 plan’s mitigation hierarchy is structured as follows:

  • Transmission system maintenance and hardening
  • Situational models and analysis focused on mitigation strategies
  • Operational settings to ensure grid reliability and provide quick responses
  • Power shutoffs during extreme weather to minimize ignition risks

The agency is currently facing major federal lawsuits for its alleged role in the 2020 Holiday Farm Fire in Oregon, which destroyed over 500 homes and left one person dead. A judge ruled in February that the agency intentionally destroyed evidence that could have tied it to the fire’s ignition, including moving trees off power lines after being told by wildfire investigators to stay out of the area.

“BPA willfully spoiled evidence because it moved trees of interest and allowed its contractors to materially disturb the ignition site without preserving evidence it knew it should, and could, preserve in reasonable anticipation of litigation,” the judge wrote.

Part of the agency’s new plan includes a restructured governance structure, which officials said fosters “agency wide coordination” and relies on external collaboration and accountability.

“BPA established a governance structure for wildfire mitigation that includes a cross-functional team to discuss and recommend strategies, a steering committee to provide approval authority and a sponsor advisory group to foster communication with executive level personnel,” the agency said in its new plan.

Click here to read the agency’s full 2026 plan.

AI predicts wildfire risk faster than current warning systems, new study finds

A wildfire forecasting system powered by artificial intelligence was around 30% better at identifying dangerous fire conditions in advance than the models currently used, according to new research.

The Australian and New Zealand researchers’ study, published in the International Journal of Wildland Fire, trained a machine learning model on historical weather and fire data from three different fire-climate regimes across Australia, specifically the subtropical Sunshine Coast, peri-urban Brisbane and temperate Hobart areas. They then tested it against Australia’s current wildfire risk system, the fuel-specific Fire Behaviour Index.

The machine-learning model outperformed the current forecasting model by 10% to 30%, depending on the scenario, the researchers found. The AI-based model also doubled potential financial savings compared with the Fire Behaviour Index.

An immediate limitation was the frequency with which the current model updated wildfire data compared to the new machine learning model. Current systems could only compute wildfire forecasts hourly and release a risk rating to the public only once a day. But the machine-learning system could update its information every 30 minutes, providing near-real-time insight.

“Wildfires don’t wait for the daily forecast. If fire weather conditions can change within hours, our warning systems need to move just as quickly,” lead author Alberto Ardid said in a Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha | University of Canterbury press release. We originally developed the model as a proof of concept in one region. However, in this new study, we tested it across multiple regions to see whether the approach works under different fire weather conditions.”

Click here to read the full research.

Synchronized wildfires will strain global fire resources: report

While the trend to more extreme fire weather days is well understood for many regions worldwide, a new study has identified the rising incidence of widespread concurrent extreme fire weather days across multiple global regions. The increased risk of concurrent fires poses significant social and ecological consequences and may complicate the global sharing of fire suppression and other resources.

Researchers from the University of California, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and other institutions looked into trends of synchronous fire weather to identify the risks it poses to communities and fire response. Previous studies found that the increasing trends intensify the demands on fire suppression efforts, worsen air pollution, and adversely impact human health, but these researchers hoped to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon.

The researchers analyzed trends of synchronous fire weather in 14 regions defined by the Global Fire Emissions Database and explored the relationships between the weather, climate variability, and air pollution exposure. They found “significant” positive increases in synchronous fire weather across most of the world’s regions over the past 50 years, including the western US, Europe, and Australia, along with South America and Southern Africa, both recognized as major global carbon emission hotspots.

Matt Jones, a scientist at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and one of the study’s authors, said the increase in fire weather will strain the numerous wildfire response resource-sharing agreements that numerous countries rely on.

“If one country is already managing a high-risk situation at home, sending support elsewhere may simply not be possible,” Jones said. “In effect, rising synchrony increases competition for finite firefighting resources.”

Jones also said the trends identified by the study signal the need for a further focus on how the increasing pattern of synchronous fire weather may evolve under future climate change and closer collaboration among fire management agencies in workforce planning and mutual aid agreements.

Click here to read the full study in Science Advances.

"Safety" or "risk management" in wildland fire?

The Colorado Fire Camp sent out a message from their Twitter account to their 101 followers on October 21 which said:

#OSHA vs. wildfire agencies: Safety & Health no longer goal of #NWCG structure, new focus on risk management http://bit.ly/4oy38E 2:50 PM Oct 21st from TweetDeck

To say that safety and health are no longer goals of the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) seemed rather surprising, so I went to the link, which leads to an organization chart showing the Committees of the NWCG.

NWCG_Preparedness_Branch_Committees

A portion of the chart is shown here on the right. As you can see, the organization is changing. The “Safety and Health Working Team” is becoming the “Risk Management” committee, and the “Incident Operations Standards Working Team” is merging with the “Training Working Team” to become the “Operations and Workforce Development” committee.

To say that “safety and health is no longer a goal” of the NWCG is misleading at best. And yes, the term “safety” in the organization chart has been replaced with “risk management”. But that does not mean that “safety and health is no longer a goal”.

Here are some definitions of the term “risk management”.

  • Risk Management is the identification, assessment, and prioritization of risks followed by coordinated and economical application of resources to minimize, monitor, and control the probability and/or impact of unfortunate events. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_management
  • The process of determining the maximum acceptable level of overall risk to and from a proposed activity, then using risk assessment techniques to determine the initial level of risk and, if this is excessive, developing a strategy to ameliorate appropriate individual risks until the overall level of risk is reduced to an acceptable level. en.wiktionary.org/wiki/risk_management
  • Risk management is the active process of identifying, assessing, communicating and managing the risks facing an organization to ensure that an organization meets its objectives. www.lesrisk.com/glossary.htm
  • The technique or profession of assessing, minimizing, and preventing accidental loss to a business, as through the use of insurance, safety measures, etc. Origin: 1960–65. Dictionary.com

I exchanged some email messages with Michelle Ryerson, the fire safety program manager for the Bureau of Land Management, the current chair of the Safety and Health Working Team, and interim chair for the Risk Management Committee. I asked about the reason for the changes and she said the name change better reflects their approach to safe and effective fireline operations. The reorganization of the NWCG gave the groups an opportunity to change the names, encompassing a more comprehensive programmatic approach.

“We are in the process of converting over”, she said, “but have not been officially chartered under the new title of ‘Risk Management Committee’ (mission will remain the same) — plan to have conversion happen early spring of 2010 and will make note of it on our website”.

I asked what the effect of the change would be on firefighters. She responded:Continue reading