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Lesson 8 - Case Project 1

8.5 - Adding Fire Sources to TEISS Projects

Fires are treated in a special way in TEISS. Inventories have shown that wild and prescribed forest fires, range fires and agricultural burns can be very large sources of air pollution, especially during years with many large wildfires. Because the amount of pollution that fires can emit is so high and the locations of fires are usually well known, some in the emission inventory community have decided they should be treated as point sources (with their release point located roughly in the middle of the fire area).

If you are not concerned about these kinds of fires on your reservation, you can skip this section.

TEISS was originally built to the specifications of the Tribal Data Development Group (TDDWG) of the Western Regional Air Partnership (WRAP). The WRAP Policy on Fire Tracking Systems was used to guide the way that TEISS collects and organizes information on fires. In this section, we'll show you the data that TEISS requests to characterize fires completely.

Fires are tracked on a separate module in TEISS, the FIRE TRACKING SYSTEM



Fires entered into TEISS are exported to NIF3.0 as Point Sources. The Release Point location is taken as the centroid of the polygon burn area.

You can enter a fire source in TEISS graphically, using the Fire tool to draw the approximate boundaries of the burned area on your map. When you have closed the shape (by clicking on the starting point), the Outline view will open in the fire tracking system to allow you to enter more information about the fire.



The WRAP determined seven essential components that are necessary in order to consistently calculate emissions and to uniformly assess impacts to regional haze:

1. Date of Burn
2. Burn Location
3. Area of Burn
4. Fuel Type
5. Pre-Burn Fuel Loading
6. Type of Burn
7. Classification: Anthropogenic or Natural

Date of Burn: Specify the Start and End of when the emissions start and cease. Often, a fire will smoke and smolder for a long time after the flames are out, producing large amounts of air pollution.

Burn Location: You can specify the location of the burn area according to the Public Land Survey System (PLSS). This method of describing fire locations is often used by fire managers. (You can also graphically draw the fire in the TEISS main map interface using the fire tool.)

Area of Burn: Specify the burned area in acres. Blackened areas should be determined post-burn. For a pile burn, the area burned should be represented by the dimensions of the pile as well as the number of piles consumed.

Fuel Type: Specify the fuel type that represents the predominant fuel or cover type consumed in the fire. Emissions from fire are highly dependent upon the fuel or cover type (e.g., ponderosa pine, juniper, orchard residue, rice straw).

Pre-Burn Fuel Loading: Specify the amount of fuel present at the burn location (tons/acre). This information usually needs to be obtained from a fire manager. The more accurate the pre-burn fuel loading, the better the subsequent emissions estimates will be.

Type of Burn: Specify the predominant configuration of the fuel burned (e.g., pile, windrow, broadcast, underburn). TEISS View provides a drop-down list with some options. You can also type in if not in the list.

Natural or Anthropogenic Classification:
Anthropogenic: a human-caused source of fire
Natural: a natural source of fire


The Natural or Anthropogenic classification is added automatically in relation to what SCC code you enter.

Optional information: Other information that you can choose to track in TEISS are:

• Fuel Consumption [%]
  
  
• Fuel Moisture [%]
  
  
• Purpose of Burn
  
  
• Non-Burning Alternatives
  
  
• Additional Tracking Information
  
  

TEISS Exercise: Use the TEISS Training Manual to continue work on Case 1. Work through Section 6 then return to the web course before starting Section 7 on exporting project data. The web course will provide some introductory information on validation, exporting to the NEI and reporting.


Post questions and comments to the Bulletin Board. Go to Bulletin Board.

End of Lesson 8.5

Lesson 8.4

Lesson 8.6