Water Resources Research Act Program

Details for Project ID 2017NM188B

EFFECT OF WILDFIRE ASH ON WATER QUALITY

Institute: New Mexico
Year Established: 2017 Start Date: 2017-03-01 End Date: 2018-02-28
Total Federal Funds: $17,000 Total Non-Federal Funds: $34,000

Principal Investigators: Jose Cerrato

Project Summary: Wildfires result in profound economic and societal impacts. Uncontrolled human development has significantly contributed to increased fire activity causing dramatic landscape changes that affect the transport of water to streams. This is especially important in semi-arid regions facing severe challenges of water scarcity. The combination of earlier spring snowmelt (Knowles et al. 2006), decreased winter precipitation (Seager et al. 2009), and greater vapor- pressure deficit in the warm season (Williams et al. 2013) has caused substantial water limitation stress on western US forests (Van Mantgem et al. 2009). These complex interactions have resulted in large-scale increased wildfire activity.