| Wildland fires are necessary for regeneration and stimulation of soils and plant growth as well as for forest management practices. In the United States, increased fire suppression and prescribed burn activities have decreased the number of total fires over time but, instead of seeing a reduction in fire size as well, fires are becoming larger. These large fires have the potential to release substantial amounts of smoke which can lead to poor air quality and reduce visibility. The BlueSky Smoke Modeling Framework is designed to assist fire and air quality managers in predicting the timing, location and magnitude of smoke impacts from wildland fires. In this study, large wildfire episodes in California were used to examine BlueSky's ability to accurately predict timing and location of wildfire smoke impacts. This analysis is necessary as BlueSky is being used more and more as a one-stop shopping tool for predicting smoke concentration and emissions across the United States, but the accuracy and uncertainties in BlueSky predictions are still largely unknown. This study found BlueSky able to highlight areas of potential smoke impact by reliably predicting long-range transport of wildfire smoke plumes. The magnitudes of potential smoke impacts were less reliable with accurate predicted surface PM2.5 concentrations occurring infrequently and only when observed magnitudes were greater than 10 mug m-3. |
