90 Kilometer Buffer

In previous LANDFIRE (LF) versions, LF products had a minimal and variable buffer ranging from 0 to 3 kilometers (km) beyond the borders of United States (U.S.) lands and territories. Now, in response to user requests, the LF 2016 Remap products for Alaska (AK) have been created with a 90km buffer into Canada.

This data will support a number of business needs and analyses such as, but not limited to, wildland fire with fire behavior projections and assessments, fuel treatments, risk assessments, firefighter and public safety issues, wildlife habitat, carbon, etc. It will also support analysis of cross-border incidents and land management planning that abuts international borders.

Plot data, Landsat imagery, lidar, climate, and other ancillary data were used to model and map AK which aided map development for the 90km buffer along the 1,538-mile border with Canada. However, differences in data availability required some substitutions and corrections (see Within the 90km Buffer below). The 90km (AK plus buffer) and AK/U.S. (AK without buffer) extents can be downloaded as mosaic zip bundles, allowing users the ability to choose the extent that best meets their needs. Instructions on how to clip the data can be found (here).

Download zip bundle:

• AK/U.S. extent [img] (15.349 MB)
• AK+90km extent [img] (15.567 MB)

Within the 90km Buffer:

• Vegetation products were mapped in a similar manner as within AK; however, there were no training plots in Canada for our classification and regression tree models. Therefore, all model training was based on AK vegetation plots. LF extended modeling boundaries to include the 90km extent and mapped it concurrent with the 0km extent.
• Inputs for developed and agriculture classes within the buffer included available topographic data and Daymet climate variables, as well as North American Land Change Monitoring System data (instead of the National Land Cover Database that was used in AK and CONUS).
• Disturbance products were also processed similarly to AK; however, no Events Geodatabase information was available within Canada (other than large fires).
• Fuel rules and assignments are the same for AK and Canada; however, there were no disturbance data available on the Canadian side of the border. The vegetation types that were used to describe the landscapes in AK were also used to designate the vegetation in the buffer. Since the same vegetation types were used on both sides of the border, the same fuel rulesets were used to assign fuels to the buffer on the Canadian side of the border.

Continuing efforts for the 90km buffer

In future LF production efforts, we plan to add a 90km buffer into the land of neighboring nations. With 1,933 miles of shared border between the U.S. and Mexico and 5,525 miles of shared border with Canada (including AK's border), this equates to approximately 417,000 square miles of land covered within the planned 90km buffer.