congratulations on all your success. [applause] >> join us tonight when ukraine's prosecutor general discusses suspected war crimes committed by the russian military. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2022] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] you can watch at 9:45 eastern on c-span, c-span now, our mobile video app, or anytime online at c-span.org. >> joining us this morning is the founder and executive director of 1st street foundation, here to talk about a new report by the group on wildfires. tens of millions of u.s. properties face wildfire risk. you found one in five single-family homes in the u.s. is at risk of a wildfire, being in a wildfire over the next 30 years. tell us why. >> the report looks at a few

things. first and foremost, the state of fuels across the country, things like forests that can combust. the likelihood of ignition, and subsequent wildfires spreading across the country through 2022. what we found when we look at this year's risk within the approach we use, is that there are tens of millions of homes that face some level of risk from wildfire. >> just in 2020 two that's right. -- just in 2020 that's right. when you look at the probability, we find there are 30 million properties that have severe risk. if you have that home for a 30 year period and a typical mortgage, you have a 1% chance of wildfire reaching your building. 30 million properties have that

risk. >> how did you calculate this? >> we worked with a great group of academics and for-profit institutions in this space that have spent decades on the topic. these are experts in fuels, climatology, the weather. what we were able to do is use software to create 100 million wildfire simulations. we look across all the different places wildfires could have started. we look at the potential weather scenarios over a ten-year period and then we simulate those fires. we watch where they go and if they impact a property, we use what is called a monte carlo simulation. looking at the different times wildfires spread, how many made it to that property, then what would the odds of that be of that happening today?

because we do it so many times over and over, we get a good picture of the likelihood of homes being impacted by wildfire. but we didn't just look at today. we simulated the conditions 30 years from now when it is hotter and drier and fuels are more likely to combust. we ran another 100 million simulations in that period to understand how wildfire will change over that 30 year period from the impacts of climate. >> and why did you try, why did you want to do this study? >> up to this point, there hasn't been a way to look at specific property risks from wildfire. the forest service does a great job and they have a thing called wildfire risk to communities. that allows you to look up relative risk. my county's risk relative to another county. it is made for understanding risk from a high level so you

can take action on management. what we were looking at is something different that didn't exist, which is how likely is that specific home to be in a wildfire? further to that, how likely is that home to combust from those wildfires? knowing the intensity of the flames that make it to the property, then what is the consequence? looking at two things, the exposure, the likelihood of wildfire and the consequence, the flames actually causing the home to combust or the embers shooting out from a wildfire and landing on a home causing it to combust. this hasn't existed before. we released the findings of the report and if you go to our website, you can type in your address and see how likely your home is to be impacted by a wildfire and the subsequent consequences of that. >> what do you think insurance companies do with this information? >> insurance companies are little different in the sense

of, they aren't like a typical homeowner. an insurance company looks for a 12 month policy so they typically have you for an annual premium that covers risk over a one-year period. they are looking at risk, how likely is it that someone will have something happen to their home, wildfire reaches it, and it actually burns down and i have to pay out on the policy? they look at a different methodological approach. homeowners are different. they care about the only one home that they own or rent or looking to sell. they are looking at it over a period of time than is typically longer than one year. if you think of probability, it is a little different than insurance companies over a 12 month period because if you own a home for 30 years, your annual risk adds up over time. it is called a cumulative risk.

if you have a 1% risk today of being in a wildfire or your home potentially flooding and you own the home for 30 years, that means over 30 years, it is a 26% chance of that actually happening. a one in four chance which sounds different than a 1% annual risk because it is 1% each given year or over -- over 30 years. if you care about a home, looking at risk of or a cumulative period, it is different from a one-year policy. >> are most of these homes out west? is this the area you focused on? >> instinctively and intuitively, everyone hears about wildfires out west so logically you would think that is where the majority of risk is. there is a ton of risk out west, but there is also a lot of risk in places like texas, florida. when you look at the highest level of risk, the 1% annual

risk of being in a wildfire, we see the number of upper these in florida, texas and california are about the same. if we look at the change in climate over 30 years and what changes, the state of fuel and heat and combustion 30 years from now, that is where you see the west coast is about six times what it is today, whereas florida and texas and other places are doubling. astonishing numbers, to say they are only doubling in texas and florida. there is a six times multiple in california of homes that have extreme risk. by and large, the numbers are what you would expect in the west coast today but the shocking places are these other locations that typically you don't hear about wildfires, because they are big, broad wildfires -- they are not big, broad wildfires, they are more

concentrated. it is less acres and acres that are burning. >> matthew is founder and executive director of the 1st street foundation. if you live in the eastern central part of the country, dial in with questions and comments at 202-7 48-8000. in the mountain pacific area, (202) 748-8001. send us a text at (202) 748-8003 with your city and state. what are the contributing factors to risk of a wildfire? >> as i mentioned, the first and foremost is what can catch on fire. those are typically called fuels. we look at the fuels across the country, and we look at, we know where the trees are, the types of trees and shrubs and all the different state of the fuels as we are talking about, then we want to know how likely it is

for something to catch on fire. that is from things that are human caused, everything from power utility lines that come through or someone throws a cigarette out of the car or even gender reveal parties that we have seen actually have pyrotechnics start forest fires. the human causes and the natural causes, like lightning strikes that start the field on fire. once that starts, the next most important thing is whether it will keep going from the weather. that matters with humidity and wind. those two things come along with the heat that is going on that causes the fuel to dry out and combust. then it really makes the conditions on whether the wildfire begins to spread and where it split -- spreads or whether it is suppressed. suppression is the forest service or other people trying to put the fires out.

taking all of those into account is how we create our model using software that simulates all of these things and we do it over and over to know where it is that the wildfires will get to, and once they are there, we partnered with a large engineering company and what they have looked at is, based on all the different home types and structures, how combustible are they? if a flame that is eight feet high or six feet high, so different levels of intensity, how hot they are, makes it to the structure and it is made of vinyl siding or brick and it has a groove or all these different components, how likely is it to combust and subsequently burned down? bringing all of these elements together, we are able to tell you not just exposure across the country, the risk, but how many homes would potentially combust and have that event happen.

>> i want to play for you and our viewers jeff from the interior department, testifying about wildfires and forest management amid climate change. here is what he said. >> climate change drives the devastating intersection of extreme heat, drought and wildfire danger across the u.s., creating wildfires that move with the speed and intensity previously unseen. climate change has created a continuous fire year for our nation and american communities continue to bear the brunt of the resulting cycle of intensifying droughts, wildfires and poor air quality. funding provided by the infrastructure law supports efforts to mitigate the impact of these changes on fire and better safeguard people, communities and resources. the drought outlook for much of the u.s. is concerning. climate prediction center's seasonal drought outlook shows

drought across nearly all of the west. even in areas that have seen above normal rainfall this past winter, we may expect them to experience increased spring vegetation growth, then fast-moving wildfires during a dry, hot summer. >> this is a headline from the los angeles times, admitted -- amid severe drought, calls for revamping the colorado river and the states around at the chair the water and have a sharing agreement. what are your thoughts on drought conditions? that is a factor to the wildfire risk. >> throat is one of the main components of a dryer forest or vegetation, and that is what actually combust. when we go through drought and we don't have the precipitation that is actually causing the water in the forest to stay at

the levels we want so it is not as likely to combust, that is what we see as the conditions that are concerning. red flag days that happen. when is a wildfire likely? that is caused by heat, lack of humidity with the drought stuff that we mentioned, and wind speeds after combustion, after it starts. where is the wind pushing it? as you heard, what we see is that vegetation that grows up during the spring, if it is dried out, that is what causes wildfires to move quickly and actually get up into the

canopies. once you have wildfire in the trees, that is when it moves from tree to tree and those are those intensifiers that are difficult to put out. we also touched on air quality. that is one of the big things from smoke when you have these large wildfires. you have continuous wildfires and there is a lot of smoke that comes off of them. while you may not be at risk of a wildfire making it to you, the wind blows the smoke into your community and you have poor air quality days. then you have not just the direct risk of wildfire, but the second consequences through air quality and smoke impact. >> we will get calls. first, explain your background and why you created this organization. >> sure. before starting the 1st street foundation i spent years at the weather channel working with 220 climatologists, meteorologists, understanding what was the issue with climate. with that knowledge and understanding, i started the foundation so we could actually have the experts come together to create physical climate

models. so the flood, heat, wildfire, wind, the things that are actually changing and from the climate, and impacting things like structures and homes. that is what we wanted to do. we started at looking at floods. we brought experts and flooding together to model every type of flooding, from hurricane storm surge to precipitation, and really do that in an open and transparent way. everything we do goes through the peer review process and every one of our methods is on our website so we are pushing science forward and everyone can build off the backs of each other. our research is built off decades of work done before us so we can keep moving that forward. we did the same thing with wildfire. we partnered with 50 experts in the wildfire domain, climatologists, weather experts,

so we could bring this expertise together, draw up a national model at a high enough resolution that we could apply it to individual structures, then turn it into a website that is informative for individuals for flooding at wildfires. and the datasets are available for the federal government and state government and local government to use to understand how to mitigate and adapt to these risks from flooding or wildfires. >> ken in arizona, welcome. go ahead with your question or comments. good morning? in golden valley, arizona? >> good morning. >> we are listening to you. go ahead with your question or comment. >> i'm a retired forest service employee. i spent 36 years in wildland firefighting and fire investigation.

one of the things is, there is a big difference between climate change and global warming. the climate has always been changing in the world since the beginning of time. global warming is basically a theory. one of the things i have seen since, and my career was that population has increased, more people move into forest, which causes, which puts people at risk. they are moving into areas that can't be protected, which in most cases means firefighting efforts have to go towards protecting structures instead of putting out the fire. it also means there is more manpower. >> matthew, let's take that point. >> if we look at noaa's natural disaster list they started tracking in 1980 and we look at the years since then up until this last year, we see in the

last five years 66% of all damage has happened. so i would argue there is a very clear sign that wildfires and wildfire damages are going up and to the right and there is an exponential impact of wildfires. that does have things like the consequences of people moving out of cities and more into what's called the wildland urban interface, which does have damages, but the severity and size of the fires are unprecedented. i don't believe that is just from the folks starting fires and not enough resources. i think there is a clear and proven signal between heat and combustion and climate change that is causing that. >> ken, you have a follow-up? >> is your speaker familiar with the fires of 1910? those were huge wildfires that

went across the northwestern united states. it was probably just as severe as any fire we have now. the main difference was, we didn't have people in the way. i think your speaker is pushing the global warming, you know, that is what he is pushing, global warming. i don't agree with that. >> matthew, is that what you are doing? >> i think we are talking about probability. there is a probability of something happening like a large fire in 1910 and that could happen again. the question is, how frequent are those? is the frequency of those events , or the size of the fires, growing over time? that is what we have seen. it is observed, not a hypothesis. these are observed events and interactions that we are seeing. that has to do with warmer environments and changing

forests because it is hotter out with less humidity. >> larry in florida, good morning. >> good morning. i have a question plus a theory. i like to ask, how many big jets we have the drop the chemical down? every time i watch these fires, i see one jacked and maybe 20 helicopters -- one jet and maybe 20 helicopters. why don't we have more of these jet planes that carry 100,000, 200,000 gallons? wipe out the fire from the start. if we had 10 of those flying around. my theory is, some people don't care if homes burned down because that creates money for them because people have to buy new furniture, cars, etc.

so if he could answer the first question about how many of the big jets we have. >> i'm not sure how many of the jets are there for firefighting and protection and suppression. that the forest service or state and local officials have at their disposal. i know it is different across each state but there are billions of dollars spent on it and rightfully so each year to try to ensure we have the right suppression techniques available to us and are able to do things like fuel treatments or cutting fire breaks, all of these important things so we can mitigate the fires as much as possible and keep them at bay. unfortunately, as these things grow, the forests are getting drier and we end up with wildfires starting. it is hard to put them out when the fuels are there for the wildfires but they keep moving and growing and it is difficult

to suppress them as we see with wildfires in this season already burning down 160 or so homes. what we signed california with 15 or 20 homes -- saw in california with 15 or 20 homes a couple weeks ago. >> to the models show how much more potential damage there could be to these areas if we continue on this trajectory? xes. -- >> yes. there are 100,000 homes in california that have a 1% risk of being in a wildfire today. that grows to 600,000 homes by 2052. over a 30 year period, the homes that didn't have that risk increases by six times. across florida, we see that go from just over 100,000 to just over 200,000. same in texas, just over 100,000 to over 2000 -- 200,000.

we are seeing a doubling of extreme risk from wildfire across the country. which is a mind-boggling fact to think about. in such a short period of time we are seeing such a change in risk. >> i want to play for you bruce westerman, on the house natural resources committee, the only forester in congress. here is what he said on reducing wildfires. >> the truth is that even as the budgets have continued to climb for land management agencies, we aren't seeing the paradigm shift we know needs to happen if we are going to truly tackle this crisis. the primary culprits bogging down responsible management and recovery of our overgrown fire forests have been and remain onerous regulatory burdens and the weaponization of our courts by activist environmental groups that litigate even the smallest

management projects. i will keep saying this over and over, the forest and nature could care less what we say in this room. they could care less how much money the federal government sends to an agency. they keep growing on the fires keep -- and the fires keep burning. as long as we are talking and not addressing the problem, that is what they will do. >> what about his point of overgrowth of the forest? >> i think what he is mentioning is that the best intentions, you can put in treatments and do things to effectively manage the wildland urban interface so we can mitigate wildfires that take place. unfortunately, there are places where you have conflicting interests. there are environmentalist

groups that would be looking at, if you are going into this forest and trying to treat the forest to make sure it is less combustible and likely to spread, there are other things that would be on the table as you talk about it from whether it might be wildlife that are impacted or migratory patterns. that is where you end up with head-to-head on competing interests on what we should be trying to solve four. i'm not on one side or the other, but without the proper treatments, we will see this exacerbated and getting worse and worse. temperatures are increasing. forests are getting drier and they are more likely to combust. >> david in illinois. david? go ahead. one last call for david. lynn in bishop, california. >> good morning. i have to completely agree with

bruce westerman. i live in the international forest and the biggest problem in the biggest threat in california are the environmentalists that stop people from logging and cleaning out these forests. to sit there and claimed that your 30 year model, knowing what the drought conditions are going to be like in the next 30 years, is more government garbage. this is never going to be solved because every time the forest service, first of all they have lost their ability to manage any kind of lands. if they want to go in and open staff, we have dead timber everywhere in our forest and a shortage of lumber. it doesn't make any sense to somebody that has a lot of common sense and works and lives in the area. as long as we are still getting most of our goods from dirty

china and india that have zero environmental laws, and have their kids burning plastic while they are taking apart the computers we send back when we are done, it is a ridiculous statement to think that america will be put under all of these regulations when the whole world is as dirty as possible, yet america can't go to work. thank you. >> matthew, let me add to that from jay sanders who sends this question. out of the almost 30 million homes you say are at risk, how many do you estimate will actually burn in wildfires over that time? >> our model and analysis allows us to do that type of risk analysis. we are looking at that and releasing a report in q4 about the impacts and consequence of it. our first report and

calculations are around exposure. and the likely -- the likelihood of flames to make it to the property and subsequent events that could take place. the next report will be around acres burned, properties expected to be impacted on an annual basis and what that is in 30 years. you are correct and that we are looking at how many have the risk of wildfire making it to the home, which is a larger number, and there would be a smaller number of actual properties or structures that would burn down or forecast to burn down on any given year. that is what we are looking at with our academic partners and internal staff. >> who uses your data, your information? >> first and foremost, we want our data to be used by as many people as possible so we have a great partnership with filter.com. -- realtor.com. if you look at any property that is for sale or not, there is an environmental risk section.

our flood data is there. it can tell you the likelihood of a home to flood today and over a 30 year period, and fire factor, the likelihood of being in a wildfire. if you want to learn more, both of those lit -- link back to risk factor.com and give you the risk. commercial real estate sites integrate our data as well. we have great partners, whether it is on the local level, state level or federal level, that are using our data and publishing reports on it. the epa published a report with our flood data as an example. south carolina, they are using our data. everything from all the different levels of government is using that to commercial entities, like morningstar, and large agencies looking what risk

looks like with our data. >> rich in ohio? rich, good morning. >> great conversation. good morning. the idea that we are not logging enough and avoiding fires by logging more seems like a winning solution for both. the other thing i would like to know is, a tree that is 30 years old versus 100 years old, how much better does it do for the environment? it cleans the air better, better healthier lungs? it -- i would be curious to see what difference it makes. the other one is, in pennsylvania, someone looked over the hill to see where a fire was starting. i'm wondering if we could use

drones in place of a fire tired to keep track of fires and catch them when they are starting rather than later on. the other one is roofs. asphalt, tile and metal roofs, what is the difference for people before they held houses to look at that? the other one is how much do insurance companies give not the right rate of dangers, then people build in flood areas because someone else is paying the insurance to cover these people on flood zones? i will hang up and listen to the answer. >> a bunch of great questions. one of the things you brought up is older growth trees versus younger trees. the difference obviously is, they can consume a lot more carbon and actually clean the air as you are talking about but lower in missions. older trees and more mature trees are more valuable than smaller saplings that need to

grow. definitely a big difference there. from a logging perspective or value perspective like you were talking about, there are trade-offs. definitely something where we want to keep as many of these old-growth trees around to help us with the issues around co2 and ensuring these issues don't get worse. with things like how combustible a certain type of growth is, there are -- a certain type of roof is, metal roofs don't combust. asphalt and cedar shake roofs have different combustion points. what we see our great home building standards put in place to ensure we have as hardened of homes as possible. the hard part are the existing structures. if you already have a home and it is already made of combustible material, what do you do?

one of the best things you can do is what is called remove defensible space. what is defensible space? that is anything that can combust within 50 feet of your home. if you have a bunch of trees and shrubs in your backyard touching your home, they look you to full but that is one of the top reasons why a home will start on fire. the fire actually gets to the property, starts something else on fire that is beside the home, then the heat, the flame licks because the structure to combust. that is one thing you want to look at the most outside of things like your roof. the other thing that is important is simple solutions like covering your eaves. when wildfires get close to homes they are spraying embers and they are popping out in front of the fire ant covering homes. one thing we see all the time is that those embers get sucked into the airflow, into the

attic. when an amber goes up into a home, that is when we see the majority of homes that burned down, they burn from the inside out. fire will find the most vulnerable part of the home. once a wildfire is in your house there is no such thing as a little bit of wildfire in your home like there is with water and flooding. once it is there, our homes typically have very combustible things inside. pillows, blankets, whatever. that is where you see the biggest risk. you can cover the eaves with cash to make sure embers don't make it in. these are the solutions you want to think about when you look at how do you medicaid -- mitigate against the risk. >> i have a couple questions and

comments. is first-rate foundation approved as a 501(c)(3)? i don't see any of your reports. >> yes, we are a 501 c3. >> they are not showing up on the irs look up and in new york. i you associated with this ewok coalition, the outfit you lobbied for an almost $200 million bond in miami that raised people's taxes? i bring this up because this guy is talking about root lines and we need to back up and find out what his intentions are. the other thing is, i have ensured a $20 million home miles from the fires in new mexico. insurance companies know how to quantify risk. this guy is talking like nobody but him and his crew can help you figure out your flood or risk profile when insurance companies make a living doing that every day. tell us about your funding and

who gives you your money and where does it go. >> i'm not sure why you are having computer problems being able to look up our 990, but it is there. we have great donors, from grantham foundation, 20 foundation, all of that is publicly available information. they give us the money because we believe in the scientific method and open transparency. everything you would like to see about our models and methodology are on our website and they are in the scientific journals we publish everything in. i'm not sure what your concerns are with our methodological approach, but i'm welcome to talk to anyone about that. not saying insurance companies don't know how to quantify risk. they do a good job, but they look at a portfolio of risk. how likely is a structure to be impacted if i am ensuring

millions of structures, how likely is a bunch of them to to get damaged and i have to pay up? that is a different model than we created. you are looking at balancing risk as an insurance company. if i want to have an insured, i don't have maximum probable loss which is what insurance companies do. i don't want to ensure a bunch of homes because i will have to pay out a lot of money because i ensure all those homes. if they are across the country in different places, the likelihood of me having events that are different across the country and impacting them are very low. i have a balanced portfolio and i look at port olio risk and use that in pricing insurance. that is different than if i am looking at the risk to my individual home and just that structure. the insurance view is a completely different view from

what we have created. we created a viewer for -- a view for the homeowner or the homebuyer. >> john in california, good morning. >> good morning. let me put the tv on hold. i live in a national forest and chaparral environment on multiple properties. our federal, state and local open space management policies have excavated -- exacerbated these problems. but things are changing. we are seeing more -- more prescribed burns and enforcement of cutting brush around properties. since so much of this is driven by climate change, what can your organization do for us to help take the insurance risk and spread it out over a greater population base? right now, our insurance costs

are killing us here. i have a 2000 square-foot home and i'm paying over $6,000 per year for it. i have a couple a hundred square-foot rental units and they are over $3000 for each one of them per year. it is killing me. i can remove all vegetation within 100 feet of every structure. i can park a fire truck in my driveway, and it makes no difference to the insurance companies. what can we do, and what can your organization do to help us lobbied these insurance companies to get our insurance costs down and help address this problem? i will sit back and listen. >> that is a great question. it is unfortunate, i'm sorry you have to pay so much for insurance. that is where we see the risk increasing over time and premiums increasing with it. insurance companies know the risks that exist. one of two things have to

happen. we either have to lower the risk, because there are better treatments or the ability to mitigate the risk from state and local governments and the federal government, or we have to figure out better home treatment ratings for insurance. there is a group that is looking at how you actually can create a certification program for individual structures to do the things you are talking about so you get a discount within your insurance. i removed defensible space, i have a certain type. then you will be able to qualify to have cheaper insurance than someone who is not taking the same steps and ensuring that you , you don't have a woodpile behind your home or those things that add to risk. there are groups working on this because it is a large problem, where you have these increasing premiums and it becomes

unaffordable at a certain point for a vast majority of us. you are left in a difficult spot because you have to have wildfire insurance as part of homeowners insurance if you are going to have a federally backed mortgage. it is mandatory. there are people working on this, groups trying to do this exact thing. what we are hoping our data will do is inform these discussions. we can use this to have the conversation then talk about the solution you are looking for. that is the hope of what we are doing at the 1st street foundation. >> arial, new mexico. good morning. what i was calling about, i was wondering if there are studies that have been taken on the type of roofs people put on their house, how much heat that reflects into the atmosphere that could be closing -- causing

global warming. everything is white and white reflects a lot of heat. even solar panels reflect a lot of heat. i was wondering if there are studies that, that could be causing part of the global warming temperature change and asphalt thing roads -- asphalting roads and grappling properties. -- graveling properties. >> most of the heat trapping that is the big concern is that is the big concern is around the greenhouse gas omissions in the atmosphere. so less of the items that are on the ground and more the items that are in the air. you can think of it like a pollution blanket essentially where he is coming in but that is not able to get out. it's very akin to when you're in your car with the windows up on a hot summer day, it gets very hot because the heat comes in and can't get out.

that's what we see with the greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere left over from the reflective or the heat that's actually taking all that on on the ground. >> thank you very much for the conversation this morning, we appreciate it. if you're interested you can find the organization at 1st street.org. matthew, thank you. >> thank you for having me. >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government funded by these television companies and more, including cox. cox is committed to providing eligible families access to affordable internet through the connect to compete program, bridging the digital divide one connected and engaged student at a time. cox, bringing us closer. >> cox support c-span as a public service along with these other television providers giving you a front row seat to

democracy. >> coming up next, president biden's visit to japan followed by defense secretary lloyd austin in the chair of the joint chiefs of staff discussing military aid for ukraine. then the world economic forum hearing from ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy as ukraine's prosecutor general talking about efforts to hold russian soldiers accountable for war crimes. >> president biden held a news conference with the prime minister of japan. when asked about taiwan the president said the u.s. would be prepared to intervene militarily if there was an invasion by china. >> ladies and gentlemen, the prime minister of japan of the president of the united states.