The global wildland–urban interface

The wildland–urban interface (WUI) is where buildings and wildland vegetation meet or intermingle 1 , 2 . It is where human–environmental conflicts and risks can be concentrated, including the loss of houses and lives to wildfire, habitat loss and fragmentation and the spread of zoonotic diseases 3...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature (London) Vol. 621; no. 7977; pp. 94 - 99
Main Authors: Schug, Franz, Bar-Massada, Avi, Carlson, Amanda R., Cox, Heather, Hawbaker, Todd J., Helmers, David, Hostert, Patrick, Kaim, Dominik, Kasraee, Neda K., Martinuzzi, Sebastián, Mockrin, Miranda H., Pfoch, Kira A., Radeloff, Volker C.
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 07.09.2023
Nature Publishing Group
Subjects:
704/158/2445
704/158/2465
704/172/4081
704/4111
704/844/685
Africa
Biomass
Cities - statistics & numerical data
Climate Change
Datasets
Ecosystems
Environmental conflicts
Europe
Fire hazards
Forests
Geographic Mapping
Grasslands
Habitat fragmentation
Habitat loss
Housing
Housing - supply & distribution
Housing - trends
Humanities and Social Sciences
Humans
Land area
Land cover
Mixed forests
multidisciplinary
Population Density
Remote sensing
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Urban areas
Urbanization
Vegetation
Vegetation patterns
Wetlands
Wilderness
Wildfires
Wildfires - prevention & control
Wildfires - statistics & numerical data
Wildland-urban interface
Zoonoses
Europe
Africa
South America
Ecuador
Sri Lanka
Japan
Philippines
North America
India
Lebanon
Southeast Asia
El Salvador
Asia
China
Poland
Brazil
Uganda
Jamaica
Australia
France
East Africa
Indonesia
ISSN:0028-0836, 1476-4687, 1476-4687
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:The wildland–urban interface (WUI) is where buildings and wildland vegetation meet or intermingle 1 , 2 . It is where human–environmental conflicts and risks can be concentrated, including the loss of houses and lives to wildfire, habitat loss and fragmentation and the spread of zoonotic diseases 3 . However, a global analysis of the WUI has been lacking. Here, we present a global map of the 2020 WUI at 10 m resolution using a globally consistent and validated approach based on remote sensing-derived datasets of building area 4 and wildland vegetation 5 . We show that the WUI is a global phenomenon, identify many previously undocumented WUI hotspots and highlight the wide range of population density, land cover types and biomass levels in different parts of the global WUI. The WUI covers only 4.7% of the land surface but is home to nearly half its population (3.5 billion). The WUI is especially widespread in Europe (15% of the land area) and the temperate broadleaf and mixed forests biome (18%). Of all people living near 2003–2020 wildfires (0.4 billion), two thirds have their home in the WUI, most of them in Africa (150 million). Given that wildfire activity is predicted to increase because of climate change in many regions 6 , there is a need to understand housing growth and vegetation patterns as drivers of WUI change. A global assessment shows that the wildland–urban interface occurs on all continents, showing its broad-scale patterns and providing a basis for future research on dynamics and socioeconomic and biophysical processes.
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ISSN:0028-0836
1476-4687
1476-4687
DOI:10.1038/s41586-023-06320-0