A Model Linkage to Assess the Effects of Wildfire on Water Quality
Citation:
Venable, Karretta. A Model Linkage to Assess the Effects of Wildfire on Water Quality. 2023 ORISE Ignite Off! Competition, Athens, GA, August 02, 2023.
Impact/Purpose:
Presentation for the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE) 2023 Ignite Off! competition. This presentation showcases Kar’retta Venable's research related to wildland fire modeling in support of EPA's supporting wildland fire research.
Description:
Wildfire activity in western US forests has increased over the last two decades, increasing solid and nutrient loadings to streams, and in some cases threatening drinking water supplies. Here, we demonstrate that a linked LANDIS-VELMA modeling approach can simulate wildland fire effects on water quality, using the Hayman Fire of 2002, one of the largest wildfires in Colorado's history. Using the LANDIS-II forest landscape model to simulate pre-fire forest composition and the VELMA eco-hydrologic model to simulate pre- and postfire water quantity and quality, the best performance for calibration yielded an NSE of 0.663 during 2000 to 2006 and 0.978 during 2006 in comparison to NLDAS daily runoff. Postfire, elevated concentrations of carbon and nitrogen negatively affected water quality in the simulations. Overall, our findings suggest researchers and managers can use this linked forest model to understand forest disturbances and potential management interventions to protect drinking water supplies.