Interdiction optimization approach to forest fuel treatment planning

Abstract

In this master s thesis, it is presented the problem of mitigating the damage caused in a landscape by a wildfire. Specifically, in the problem, wildfire managers aim to minimize the impact of a worst-case wildfire on the landscape, by implementing fuel treatment. A min-max interdiction model is formulated. Regarding the solving method, the original problem is reformulated decomposing it into two subproblems which are solved alternatively, one of them exactly and the other one with a heuristic procedure, in an iterative algorithm. The problem, the formulation, and the solving method are described, and the results for a real test case are analysed.