Abstract
This paper explores gaps, opportunities and future technology needs for satellite Earth Observation (EO) to address wildland fire science and applications for the next Decadal Survey time-period focusing on: 1) pre-fire fuels, 2) active fire monitoring, 3) smoke and aerosol observation, and 4) post-fire recovery. This paper stems from a workshop of over 40 experts in wildland fire science and applications. We find that advancing wildland fire science and applications for the 2028 – 2037 Decadal Survey time-period and beyond, will require more dynamic, integrated, and interoperable EO systems. There is a need to move beyond static and abstracted variables, towards validated, precise and meaningful measurements. High accuracy thermal, imaging spectroscopy, LiDAR, SAR, and (shortwave) optical and spectrometer observations—combined with coordinated field campaigns for validation and calibration—will enable the retrieval of detailed, physically meaningful measurements of fire behavior and impacts. Meeting these needs also demands integrated and interoperable EO architectures that provide concurrent measurements of fuels, weather, and active fire conditions of combustion processes and energetic distribution, leverage AI/ML for low-latency onboard processing and adhere to standardized data sharing principles. These advances will allow next-generation fire prediction models to ingest dynamic EO inputs toward process-level simulation of fire behavior and smoke modeling, and support near-real-time operational forecasting and tactical responses. As the EO landscape becomes more diverse and with the increase of fire frequency and intensity, new dedicated collaboration paradigms cross-cutting Earth system spheres (atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, geosphere) and integrating public, private, and nonprofit sectors will be essential to deliver comprehensive wildland fire observations required for future resilience.