Effects Of Land Cover, Topography, And Wind On Fire Spread In Kalimantan Using Cellular Automata

Abstract

Forest and land fires cause various negative impacts on human life and the environment. Understanding the fire spread over an area is important for developing a mitigation strategy. This paper aims to model the fire spread in Kalimantan using Cellular Automata. Simulations of the effects of land cover, terrain, and wind on fire spread during September 2015 are presented. Our results reveal that the proposed model can describe fire spread reliably well, showing that the most impacted area occurs in the southern part of Kalimantan. For the wind effect, its direction to the north is seemingly the dominant direction for the fire spread at most locations and affects fire spreads much faster in lowlands than in other locations. The present study also summarizes that the type of land cover gives more influence to the fire spread rate on lowlands, while the elevation contributes more to accelerating the fire spread over complex terrain.