By some measurements, 2023 was a significant year for prescribed fire in Butte County.
The Butte County Air Quality Management District, which dispenses permits to prescribed fire projects of a certain size and type, authorized burns on at least 1,881 acres this past year. That’s around 500 more acres than it permitted in 2022 and 2021.
That acreage encompasses 183 different prescribed fire projects ranging from small pile burns to 100-acre burns.
Ursula Parker is Senior Air Quality Compliance Specialist at the air quality district. She said that number doesn’t even include smaller burns with private landowners.
Parker said the year saw a “huge uptick” in the number of private landowners applying to conduct prescribed burns on their own property.
“We've done a much greater number of prescribed burns on private property this year than we ever have before,” Parker said.
Part of the reason for those higher numbers is the new rule changes Cal Fire implemented in November that meant the agency stopped requiring burn permits in parts of the county.
“Cal Fire was very, very cautious about allowing private landowners to conduct a broadcast burn on their property because there was very, very real concern over the safety of the burn,” Parker said.
But this year, private landowners had one less permit to apply for before burning, leaving just one required permit from the air quality district.
Parker said the uptick in burns on private property can also be attributed to the county’s Prescribed Burn Association (PBA), which she said has begun to reach more people.
In 2023, the association helped burn more than 22 acres over nine different burn days. By year’s end, staff at the PBA said they had burned more land with more people than ever before.
David Mitchell works for the Butte County Resource Conservation District and is the coordinator for the Prescribed Burn Association.
“I think a lot of people are coming over to the idea that this is a tool that we need to use, and really enjoying the experience of fire,” Mitchell said.
Last year also saw the second largest burn in Butte County PBA history — more than nine acres near Cohasset, attended by around 40 firefighters and volunteers.
But Fire Program Manager Dallas Koller said those numbers don’t capture all the progress that’s been made in the three years since the PBA’s creation.
“Acreage isn't always the best measurement for success with us,” Koller said. “Our acres don't include the number of acres landowners have treated after we've helped them learn to build piles or help them feel comfortable with burning themselves.”
Statewide, prescribed fire has gained some significant ground.
According to the California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force, prescribed burning took place on at least 126,574 acres statewide. By contrast, 2022 saw just 84,727 acres treated with prescribed fire.
Last year was also a relatively quiet year for wildfire smoke in Butte County.
The county issued just one air quality advisory in 2023 for short-term smoke impacts in August while several wildfires burned in Siskiyou County. That’s as opposed to 2018, 2020 and 2021, when Butte County experienced lengthy and massive wildfire smoke events due to the Camp, Bear and Dixie fires.
