Current Topics:
 Touring the FPA System
Clarifying - Large Fire Module
Terminology Update
Technical Papers vs. White Papers
FPU Workload Timeline
Meet Your FPU Partners!
What's Next?
For more information visit http://fpa.nifc.gov
or call Venetia Gempler
208-947-3786
Fire Program Analysis
Fire Program Analysis (FPA) system is a common interagency decision support tool for wildland fire planning and budgeting.
This tool will enable wildland fire managers in the five federal land management agencies to plan jointly.
The Wildland Fire Leadership Council (WFLC) is a cooperative interagency organization dedicated to achieving consistent implementation of the goals, actions, and policies in the National Fire Plan and the Federal Wildland Fire Management Policy. The Council provides leadership and oversight to ensure policy coordination, accountability, and effective implementation of the National Fire Plan and the Federal Wildland Fire Management Policy.
The FPA System: - will be designed to encourage state, local, and tribal agency participation. - incorporates geospatial data which provide the means to map levels of wildland fire risk on lands across the country. - generates outcomes from fire planning units that
provide information to the national budget planning process. - will provide a way for land managers to compare
trade-offs between wildland fire program components.
- is a tool to ensure wildland fire management actions help meet performance measures outlined in the 10-Year Comprehensive Strategy.
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Touring the FPA System - Last month the newsletter described the Large Fire Module process. To recap, investment alternatives developed by Fire Planning Units (FPUs) combine with historic weather and fire occurrence data to provide inputs to the Initial Response Simulator (IRS) and Large Fire Module. Output from the IRS and Large Fire Module is used to calculate performance measures, the next box in the FPA system flow.
Calculating Performance Measures: The Performance Measure Calculator processes outputs from the Initial Response and Large Fire modules to quantify performance measures for investment alternatives. The results enable FPUs to evaluate investment alternatives' cost and performance against local land and fire management plans and interagency guidance. Once the FPU chooses their investment alternatives, the information is presented for regional or state interagency programmatic review. After programmatic review, the information is analyzed at the national level through goal programming which will be covered in a future newsletter.
Originally, the Bayesian Decision Network (BDN) was the tool FPA would use to calculate performance for each FPU. Through testing, the team determined that the BDN was not the appropriate tool to calculate FPU performance measures.
Clarifying the function of the Large Fire module - The Large Fire module analyzes the impact of different fuel treatment options on large fire behavior. This module does not model FPU resources. The Large Fire module outputs are used to evaluate performance measures.
Terminology Update: The October 2007 newsletter article "FPU Investment Alternatives" described the process FPUs follow to develop their investment alternatives. The article describes each investment alternative as a combination of initial response organization options, prevention options, and fuel treatment options. Some in the wildland fire community consider those first two options as components of the wildland fire preparedness program.
As suggested by the National Budget Leads, and to maintain consistency, the FPA project now describes the FPU investment alternatives as combinations of these two options:
- Preparedness options: includes initial response organizations and prevention programs, and
- Fuel treatment options
Not All Technical Papers are FPA White Papers!
In December's newsletter the concept of technical white papers was introduced. White papers explain why the system is using or applying certain concepts and processes. The technical papers explain how concepts and processes will be used and may contain step-by-step instructions. The Technical and White Paper web page references all the white papers and technical papers that apply to the FPA system.
FPU Workload Timeline to Support FPA Implementation - To help FPUs schedule initial work to prepare for the Fire Program Analysis System implementation, the FPA team recommends this following timeline.
Have You Met Your FPU Partners? Many FPU participants know their partners because of previous FPA planning efforts. Since then, there have been many personnel changes. This is a good time to start building and nurturing new or existing relationships. Taking the time to coordinate with your partners will pay off when you begin working together to build FPA investment alternatives and run the FPA system.
What's Next?
- February 2008 - Management Advisory Team meets in Washington D.C.
- February 2008 - FPA Internal Release 2.0, featuring advanced IRS functionality, core Large Fire functionality, and expansion of user interface capabilities.
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