Does groundwater quench wildfires?

An invitation to collaborate on research and activation

A goal here is to map out the different aspects of the water picture, to uncover the many levels of hydrological complexity, to integrate understandings from hydrologists, climate scientists, hydrogeologists, permaculturists, regenerative farmers, ecologists, conservationists, natural disaster prevention workers, and indigenous peoples - to see how it all connects.

I believe there will be new (and ancient) approaches to the world’s problems, and new (and ancient) understandings of how the earth works, that will emerge from a more holistic eco-hydro-climatological understanding.

As I have been researching down a couple of these channels where I think new approaches and understandings could emerge, I am realizing this research could move much faster through collaboration and teamwork. Collaboration is something I am a fan of (a number of years back I wrote a book called ‘Open Collaboration Encyclopedia’).

So as an experiment here, I will write up one of these directions of research, and see who would like further it along.

The research relates to an area impacting many people around the world right now - that of large wildfires, which have conflagurated in the past few years in Australia, Canada, Russia, Germany, Greece, South Africa, USA and Brazil.

The conventional approach to fire has, overwhelmingly, been about clearing and cutting down vegetation. Reducing fuel load is the rallying cry of this methodology.

But there is also another lesser known methodology, that of hydration, of restoring our water systems.

Our world once had many more wetlands, and was, in many places, filled in to the brim with groundwater. And here, perhaps lies a secret nature of how nature can better deal with wildfire.

The thesis is there are two new (and ancient) hydrological approaches. One is to increase groundwater to prevent wildfires. The other is to restore wetlands, so that they cool and humidify the winds to make them less likely to fan wildfires.

Here is the basic argument of the first approach : ‘using groundwater to prevent wildfires’.

1.      Trees bring up enough groundwater

2.      Mycelia pass the water around the soil

3.      The soil hydrates vegetation

4.      Hydrated vegetation is a less likely to spread wildfire.

If we agree with this logic, then the question then becomes one of magnitude, of how much water is being moved around, and of how much is needed to lessen wildfires.

The questions to be researched to clarify this argument are :

How much water is mycelia able to pass around? What is the rate that water flows through each hypae in the mycelia, and through the whole network of mycelia? How much water in the soil helps prevent wildfires? In different wildfire prone areas in the world, how much groundwater could trees bring up in that area if groundwater levels were high enough?

And some more action oriented, bioregional questions: If you are in an area with wildfires, how much does the water table in your area have to rise so that trees can get access to it? What can your neighborhood do to raise the groundwater that amount?

If you can help with any of these research questions that would be great.

I wrote about this topic of vegetation hydrating landscapes with groundwater in an earlier article in this newsletter, and noted NASA has research to show that more hydrated soil leads to less wildfires.

The process of bringing up groundwater by tree roots and then redistributing via mycelia is called hydraulic redistribution. In the Amazon 10% of the soil water in dry season may come from hydraulic redistribution. In the Atacama desert, the soil can stay hydrated with groundwater from below brought up by the tamarugo trees.

If it is indeed the case that groundwater can lessen the wildfires, I envision an educational and marketing campaign with slogans like ‘Groundwater quenches wildfires’, to activate local communities and governments in wildfire prone areas to increase the groundwater levels, innoculate the soil with mycelia, and continue protecting trees with deep roots.

The second thesis of how we can use water to stop fire, has to with wetlands. The argument goes as thus:

1.      Wetlands evapotranspire humidity

2.      Humidity makes winds less dry and hot

3.      Less dry and less hot winds do not spread wildfire as much

The question to research here is how much wetlands change humidity, and how much humidity makes a dent in the wildfires. Numbers will clarify. Both bioregion specific numbers and general numbers are useful.

As a general intuition, we do know that lakes release a decent amount of humidity. In the Great Lakes in the US, the lakes release enough humidity to create large amount of snow in neighboring mountains, in a process called lake effect snow.

As an example of a particular scenario to investigate lets look at California. Would restoring Owens River and Owens Lake to their original aize, on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountains, help humidify enough the Diablo and Santa Ana winds blowing over it so that they are less likely to fan wildfires in the Sierra Nevada mountains? Would restoring Tulare lake and some of the wetlands in the Central California valley area (the area used to be a quarter wetlands) humidify enough the winds blowing over the valley, to lessen its ability to fan fires in the mountains of California?

If there is evidence for this as a solid approach, I envision an educational and marketing campaign with slogans like “Wetlands whittle wildfires” to activate a wetland restoration approach to fighting wildfires.

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There are many ways to go about researching these questions. One useful tool is to use Google Scholar and look up papers, searching for keywords like ‘mycelia water transport’ or ‘wetlands humidify wind’ . Then you use sci-hub.st to read those papers for free by typing in the doi number.

If you would like to help participate and collaborate in this research, that would be awesome. There are two ways we can use to communicate your findings to these questions. One, there is a comment section at the bottom of this newsletter (you may have to click on it first to get out of your email into the newsletter site) , and two is you can email me at alplo@yahoo.com . The comment section will allow people to see what each other has found.

Thanks!

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This project is on instagram too now at @climatewaterproject . Follow there for more bite sized insights.