Wildfires and climate change have lowered the economic value of western U.S. forests by altering risk expectations
研究利用十七年地块数据，估计了野火和干旱对美国西部三州私有林地的价格影响，发现野火和气候变化导致林地经济价值下降约10%，其中大部分损失源于风险预期的改变。
There is a lack of evidence regarding how natural resource markets have responded to recent increases in climate-induced extreme events like wildfire. Wildfire can affect the economic value of forests by directly damaging the existing tree stock and by altering landowner risk expectations of future wildfire arrival. This paper uses parcel data over a seventeen-year period to estimate the effects of large wildfires and drought stress on market prices for private timberland across the three Pacific states of the western U.S. In addition to estimating the land price impacts of wildfires on parcels that were directly burned, we identify changes in risk expectations by estimating the impacts from wildfires that burned in close proximity rather than directly on timberland that was sold in the land market. Results indicate that recent increases in large wildfires and drought stress over the past two decades have lowered the economic value of timberland by approximately 10%, or about $11.2 billion in damages across the three Pacific states, with approximately 5.5% (∼$6.2 billion) due to climate change. Most of the wildfire damages arise from changes in risk expectations. Results provide evidence on the costs of climate-induced extreme events on natural capital that have already occurred.