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Episode Summary: President Biden recently rolled out a plan to treat 50 million acres of land with fire over the next 10 years. The question is—is 50 million acres actually realistic with the system we have in place right now?

Episode Notes: President Biden recently rolled out a plan to treat 50 million acres of land with fire over the next 10 years. The question is—is 50 million acres actually realistic with the system we have in place right now? We spoke with environmental law and policy expert Michael Wara about the logistics of actually putting that much fire on the ground to reduce risk in vulnerable communities, how we may not be in a place to scale it to that level yet, and what we can do to get to the necessary level of fuels reduction and fire resilience. We also talked a bit about Michael's job as the Director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program at Stanford, and what he and his students are doing in the environmental and wildland fire spaces to help fire practitioners and build fire resilience into law and policy. This is our episode one of two with Michael, with the next publishing in two weeks.

This media record is part of a series:

Life With Fire

From the Life With Fire website: "What are the benefits of prescribed burning? Why have wildfires gotten so severe lately? How can I help protect my home and community? Life With Fire podcast aims to answer these questions (and many others) while deepening our understanding of the critical role fire plays in America’s forests, lands and communities. Hosted by writer and former wildland firefighter Amanda Monthei, Life with Fire features interviews with everyone from scientists to fire management experts to Indigenous practitioners and folks doing the work on the ground. Through these interviews, Amanda hopes to explore our relationship with fire, as well as ways we can better coexist with it in the future."

Media Record Details

Feb 1, 2022
Michael Wara

Cataloging Information

Topic(s):
Fuels
Fuel Treatments & Effects
Prescribed Fire-use treatments

NRFSN number: 24375
Record updated: