Home Survival in Wildfire-Prone Areas: Building Materials and Design Considerations
Type: Nomination of a group, possibly including the nominator
Category: Educational Material - Long Publication
The target audience for this article included homeowners living in wildfire-prone areas and extension educators that have wildfire-related programs. The focus of this article was on the performance of exterior-use construction materials (e.g., roofing, siding, decking, windows) and building design issues that can make homes vulnerable to wildfire. In recent years there has been considerable information published on vegetation, vegetation management and defensible space issues. The goal of this article was to begin providing similar information regarding building materials.
The article was published as a University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources on-line 8000-series (peer reviewed) publication. It is available, free, for download.
No funds were directly used in preparing the article, however, the co-authors and I received Renewable Resources Extension Act (RREA) funding for a series of home protection-vegetation management workshops. Part of the half-day format for the workshops was a fire demonstration whereby construction components and assemblies (e.g., decks, siding, debris filled gutters attached to roof) were burned while workshop participants were able to evaluate the performance of materials. Where applicable, this information was incorporated in the article.
Being an on-line publication, it is difficult to evaluate results. It receives approximately 250 views per month on the main (UC ANR) site, but other sites have linked directly to it and therefore are not counted. The article has been included in at least one Community Wildfire Preparedness Plan (CWPP).
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Home Survival in Wildfire-Prone Areas: Building Materials and Design Considerations
- Manuscript: Quarles, Stephen L., Valachovic, Yana, Nakamura, Gary N., Nader, Glenn A., De Lasaux, Michael J. 2010. Home Survival in Wildfire-Prone Areas: Building Materials and Design Considerations. University of California ANR Publication 8393. http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8393.pdf
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