The state is still reeling from recent floods, but climatologists are already eyeing another potential hazard — wildfire.
Torrential rains in March and April have turned Hawaiʻi's landscapes green with new plant growth. Much of that vegetation is thirsty invasive grasses, which dominate Hawaiʻi's unmanaged lands. Those grasses likely won't stay green for long.
"As soon as the dry season comes up, this grass will dry out almost immediately," said Allyson Earl, a fire scientist at the University of Hawaiʻi.
As rainfall dissipates, those grasses will begin to die off, becoming potential fuels for brush fires. Clay Trauernicht, an associate extension specialist in the University of Hawaiʻi's Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management, said that if these fuels aren't addressed, Hawaiʻi is looking at a heightened risk of wildfire this coming summer.
If Hawaiʻi doesn't see another round of rain, invasive grasses could become tinder in just a few weeks, according to Trauernicht.
"So if all of a sudden the rain just turns off, within the month, you'd be wanting to look at managing fuels," he said.
Growing resources for vegetation management
Elizabeth Pickett is the co-executive director of the Hawaiʻi Wildfire Management Organization. She said for a long time, state or county resources for vegetation management were scarce.
"We have a lot of folks who are land rich and cash poor. We have a lot of communities who are willing and wanting to do vegetation management and risk reduction work, but the limiting factor has always been funding and capacity," she said.
But since the Maui fires in 2023, Pickett said the tides are starting to change.
Last year, the state Department of Land and Natural Resources set aside $1.5 million for community-led, shovel-ready vegetation management projects.
Hawaiʻi Wildfire Management Organization administered the grant program, which funded nine projects out of a pool of 22 applications.
Pickett applauded the program, but said that there is still a need for greater resources for vegetation management.
"There would have been more projects selected if there was more money," she said.
So exactly how much would the state have to invest to comprehensively address vegetation management?
Pickett said there's currently no cut-and-dried answer to that question, in part because vegetation management strategies can vary widely depending on where they are implemented.
"We don't have a per acre cost that translates from like North Kohala to South Kohala to Maui or Lahaina to Kahikinui. Every area's landscape is so different," she said.
In the wake of the Maui fires, a working group with experts from across the University of Hawaiʻi system and the Hawaiʻi Wildfire Management Organization got together to try to tackle this question.
"(Legislators) wanted to know what they could do and how much it was going to cost," said Kimberly Burnett, a research economist at the University of Hawaiʻi Economic Research Organization and working group member.
“They're like, 'What are the options? Is there a table? Can you just tell me?'"
Nothing like that existed at the time, but Burnett and her colleagues are hopeful that their analyses will soon be able to guide policymakers and land managers on how to most effectively allocate their finite resources.
The goal, according to fellow UHERO specialist and working group member Leah Bremer, is to create "a menu of options" that compares conventional vegetation management strategies like mowing with land care practices like agroforestry and watershed restoration.
While fire risk reduction may not be the focus of those practices, it is often an added benefit.
"We want to shift the way we're thinking about this problem into not just managing that vegetation, but also thinking about opportunities to use and care for this landscape in a way that's generative, not just thinking about it as a hazard all the time," Bremer said.
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