Fire Adapted 50

The Fire Adapted 50 (Project) is located adjacent to the southern edge of the King Fire Burn area which consumed 97,717 acres in the fall of 2014. The event threatened 12,000 residences, destroyed 12 residences and 68 other structures and damaged critical infrastructure including facilities, roads, bridges, and electrical transmission and distribution lines (USFS ROD King Fire 9/15).  The impact of the King Fire and prolonged drought have increased awareness about the susceptibility of communities and watershed resources to such catastrophic wildfires. As a result, CAL FIRE, the USFS and the El Dorado County & Georgetown Divide Resource Conservation Districts (RCD) in collaboration with Federal, State and local agencies and private landowners have put forth a response in the form of a long-term cohesive strategy to establish a more fire resilient Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) condition with a focus on the Highway 50 corridor.

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

The overall objectives of this project are to return forests and wildlands to a more natural, fire resilient condition and to ensure that the community’s risk has been reduced. This fuel modification treatment strategy has identified Fire Adapted 50 as a WUI defense zone where the focus is on protecting life and property. The strategic fuel management project should help to contain wildfires and facilitate long-term stewardship through practices such as continued mechanical and hand treatment and prescribed fire.

Specific objectives include:

1. Support an all-lands approach to create fire resilient and fire-adapted communities along the Highway 50 corridor,

2. Use existing fuel breaks and forest treatments to create large, more fire resilient fuel breaks,

3. Protect communities, infrastructure, and forest resources within the WUI,

4. Conduct vegetation prescriptions to reduce fire hazard, improve tree growth, and increase forest resiliency;

5. Conduct vegetation prescriptions to reduce the rate of spread, duration and intensity, and fuel ignition of crowns;

6. Retain or enhance ecosystem processes compatible with the fuel hazard reduction prescription;

7. Assess carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas reduction benefits by reducing the likelihood of wildfire emissions, improving the health and growth rates of trees and exploring various biomass utilization opportunities;

8. Identify measures that may be required to protect watershed values and water quality in watersheds that are important sources of domestic water supply;

9. Utilize the project as an educational opportunity to increase community awareness associated with living in a WUI;  

10. Retain post-treatment landscape condition under long-term stewardship agreements

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 Site visit at our Fire Adapted 50 Community Wildfire Protection Project. Thanks you CAL FIRE for all the support!

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