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New gel lets us spread flame retardant before wildfires start
The last few years have seen horrific fire seasons in California, resulting in destruction, deaths, and economic damage. And with climate change continuing unabated, things are set to get worse.
Prevention is better than firefighting; avoiding carelessness is one way to reduce the huge number of human-caused wildfires. But a paper in PNAS this week reports a new option for wildfire prevention: a fire retardant-carrying gel that coats vegetation in a thin film, keeping that vegetation safe from fire long enough to see it through fire season. If it is demonstrated to be safe, it could allow us to spray high-risk areas at the start of fire season and keep protection through until heavy rains start.
[...] Stanford materials scientist Anthony Yu and his colleagues wanted to figure out a way to get a retardant to stick to vegetation long enough to make it through California's fire season. They used nontoxic substances that are used in food and agricultural products—silica and cellulose—to make a carrier for a fire retardant that's already used in current formulations. The new gel makes the retardant stick to the vegetation for longer periods of time.
[...] The gel's longevity means that it could be sprayed at the start of wildfire season, and last long enough to offer protection until the first heavy rainfall. Once the heavy rain starts, wildfire risk starts dropping anyway.
The gel can be distributed using standard pumping equipment, so it should be quite easy to apply. And it wouldn't need to be sprayed everywhere: human-caused fires often start in high-risk places like roadsides. So, reducing wildfires wouldn't mean coating everything in retardant—focusing just on the high-risk zones would make a big difference.
Obviously, there's more testing needed before this option can be widely used, but this could be a beacon for a world facing ever more extreme wildfires.
Wildfire prevention through prophylactic treatment of high-risk landscapes using viscoelastic retardant fluids (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1907855116)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by stevegee58 on Monday October 07 2019, @10:33AM (2 children)
The problem isn't fires, it's fuel. Our policy is to suppress fires when they flair up but that only makes the situation worse. Fuel continues to build up worsening future fires and fire risk.
Let fires burn out and stop building where fire risk is high.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 07 2019, @12:15PM
Get some aborigines from Downunder, they know where and how to burn.
Even thick skulls as the libtards white men can learn to do it [abc.net.au]:
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Immerman on Monday October 07 2019, @03:31PM
Actually it's both - combined with a lack of vast herds of animals that would normally be eating that fuel.
Most wildfires are started by humans, so if we "just let them burn" then the region will be hit by wildfires of a reasonable intensity, but far more often than anything evolved to handle, and it would still be a problem.