Dense wooden house environments, e.g. Røros and Old Skudeneshavn, are linked to our past and identity, and worthy of preservation. At the same time, they are very vulnerable to fire. If a fire starts in one house, it can quickly spread. Therefore, the fire service is entitled to arrive within 10 minutes of being summoned. Wood contain water in the pores, varying with the air relative humidity. The air can contain more water when it is warmer than when it is cold. If relative humidity is 70%, the air contains 70% of the maximum amount it can contain for the given temperature. If it is cold, the amount of moisture in the air is small. When cold air enters a house, gets heated to indoor temperature, which can be 20-40 °C higher than outside. Suddenly, this air becomes "hungry" for moisture, since it can contain much more water than it does. Therefore, it attracts moisture from our skin, from green indoor plants, but also from wood materials, furniture, floors, wood paneling on walls, and ceilings. A 100 kg wooden furniture, will weigh 95 kg after some time in such dry conditions. All the wood materials in our homes are getting lighter, and more flammable. Flashover is the rapid transition for a localized fire in a room to full room involvement by igniting all smoke in the ceiling layer and spreading to all combustible surfaces within the room. Post flashover, it burns very intensely. The fire service cannot help much, if the course of the fire has progressed that far. The moisture content of wood materials, depending on air relative humidity, and the "Time to flashover" of wood materials, depending on the moisture content, can be calculated
DYNAMIC has proved that it is possible, and useful, to calculate a fire hazard indicator for wooden houses. The developed mathematical model estimates indoor humidity based on measured values for outdoor humidity (met.no). The model estimates the moisture content of wood materials, and the time to flashover. This, combined with data for wind, can give the days with extra dangerous conditions. We have developed software and systems that retrieve weather data directly from the weather stations, then the model calculates what applies in specific locations. Norway has about 70 densely built wooden sites, worthy of preservation, and we can calculate the fire risk in all of them, on an ongoing basis. At first, we used "cloud computing", but the model can also run on mobile phones (edge computing).
We chose three locations and investigated how often during the last 10 years the wooden houses were quite dry, and at the same time exposed to strong wind, and found that every winter there were between 2 and 10 such days. Frequent strong winds make coastal areas more exposed than inland areas. The low number of occurrence may allow the fire service to take extra measures, after being warned by the system 2-3 days in advance.
Towns and hamlets in coastal areas were previously surrounded by "fireproof", well-managed heather. This landscape was created about 5000 years ago. For several thousand years, the fields were burned at 10- 20 year intervals, to create good pastures, with a lot of heather, for wild sheep. Heather is evergreen, and the animals can be outside, even in winter, in areas with little snow. Heather is semi-natural, because it does not need sowing, but it needs care with burning, and grazing to survive. If not, it loses ground in the competition against other plants, and dies.
For the past ca. 70 years, we have not used the outback for grazing, because other jobs were available and agriculture switched to sheep breeds who need green grass. Gradually our unmanaged landscapes became overgrown, and we began to experience fierce fires.
We focused on 6 fires that threatened or destroyed parts of villages, and studied what challenged the fire service and what they learned from the experiences. The fire chiefs agreed that it is very important to reduce vegetation loads, especially close to the houses. This can be done with logging or controlled burning, and kept under control by increased grazing pressure.
We have helped Norway's most active heathland burning group, Haugaland Lyngbrannreserve, to burn more safely and effectively. We have contributed to annual seminars, courses for new members, and participated in burning sessions. We found that the people who become core members of such a team are somehow engaged with agriculture (farmer, or grew up on a farm) and at the same time part-time (or full-time) firefighters. These have the necessary competence and confidence to start burning in overgrown conditions, and are able to train others.
We have tested how much juniper 12 goats can eat, if they graze on a 10-acre area for two months, with a digital fence. And that's quite a lot! DYNAMIC has contributed to making dense wooden house environments and towns surrounded by degenerated heathland, a little more fire safe.
The project had close cooperation with several stakeholders important for the conservation of heathland, which increases the fire safety in the WUI. We cooperated with the civic group Haugaland Lyngbrannreserve in prescribed burns, exchanged knowledge and practices with them and assisted on prescribed burner courses. The group consists primarily of farmers, who help each other to conduct prescribed burns on own properties, but also academics and ecologists are welcome as members. Haugaland Lyngbrannreserve initially, did not have a fire safety focus. Only improved grazing, and improved visual qualities in the landscape. DYNAMIC introduced the fire safety objective, in combination with the other objectives, and the group has adopted it. They have performed burning sessions in the WUI, to reduce fire hazard in neighbourhoods, with the Fire Service present to calm the inhabitants about the temporarily increased risk. This focus will stay with them, also after the completion of DYNAMIC. Academic members of the DYNAMIC project will continue to do prescribed burns, also as "burn bosses".
The goat-project, with Nofence restriction of the animals, was “copied” by the Municipality of Karmøy summer 2023. The municipality rented 8 goats, to graze along a public tour road, close to a lake (Moksheimsvannet). Goats were also employed to graze along the fence of industrial sites in Karmøy, to avoid vegetation encroachment, and ensure visibility / control of the facility area.
The mobile application for fire risk warning is available for the three fires services that have been project partners in Dynamic, (Haugesund Brannvesen, Rogaland Brann og Redning, and Bergen Brannvesen), as well as Haugaland Brann og Redning. We will soon improve the availability of the application to all Fire Services in Norway, which have Dense Wooden Home sites within their jurisdiction.
The PhD-study of Ruben Dobler Strand, titled “Development and Evaluation of a Predictive Fire Risk Modelling and Notification System for Wooden Homes”, which he defended om January 28th, 2025, established a fruitful link between the Fire Safety and Data Science groups in HVL. Ruben Dobler Strand is now employed at the Fire Safety education at HVL. The PhD study of Anna Marie Gjedrem, titled “Innovative and Sustainable Solutions for Wildland-Urban Interface Fire Risk Management in Coastal Norway”, which she defended in November 2023, established cooperation with the European University Cyprus. She is now on a post-doc position in Australia. Four Fire Safety MSc studnets and five Data Science MSc students conducted their MSc Thesis in DYNAMIC. In addition to three Fire Safety and three Data Science BSc students, who conducted their Bachelor Thesis. Five of the students (2 MSc students and 3 Bachelor students) are also co-authors in respsective articles.
DYNAMIC is an interdisciplinary project focusing on fire disaster prevention, e.g. the 2014 Lærdalsøyri and Flatanger fires. Changes in climate, land-use, buildings, infrastructure and demography are increasing the fire risk in previously low-risk areas in Norway. DYNAMIC will map and model the abiotic, biotic, and human drivers of these changes in fire risk, develop risk forecasting strategies, and contribute to identify effective short and long term risk reducing measures.
Two interconnected innovative aspects of DYNAMIC are (i) our radical cross-disciplinary expertise, as we are the first project, to our knowledge, integrating expertise form fire science, contingency management, computer science, meteorology, risk management, health, cultural landscape management, farming, and ecosystem science, and (ii) our cross-sectorial approach where the scientists collaborate closely throughout the project period with fire brigades, farming communities, and civic habitat management interest groups. DYNAMIC shall identify and monitor significant risk contributing factors, develop forecasting systems for high risk conditions and warn the emergency systems and the public when appropriate regarding single structure fire risk, conflagration risk and Calluna (No: røsslyng) dominated WUI fire risk.
DYNAMIC shall support recent civic efforts in coastal Norway to reduce accumulated degenerated fire prone Calluna, intruded by very flammable junipers, and support and optimize innovative prescribed burning and fire control methods. Camp fires as ignition source will be addressed. Proactive emergency responses based on forecasted risk, and computer based training programs, will be developed, assessed and optimized. To reduce the likelihood of massive loss of lives, e.g. Greece and California 2018, warning systems aimed at supporting individuals at risk will be developed and tested. DYNAMIC will participate in the new IAFSS "Large Outdoor Fires & the Built Environment" Work Group.
