,2,1- 1Norwegian University of Science and Technology, faculty of engineering, department of mechanical and industrial engineering, Trondheim, Norway (chiara.bertolin@ntnu.no)
- 22 CONSTRUCT, Faculty of Engineering. University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
Over the last 25 years, wildfires have shifted from episodic hazards to persistent threats, driven by climate change and long-term socio-environmental transitions. Cultural Landscapes in Wildland–Urban Interface (WUI) areas offer valuable case studies for extracting lessons from the past, as they reflect cumulative changes in land use, demography, governance, and resilience practices.
This study aims to reconstruct historical transition pathways in wildfire risk and resilience by identifying which climatic, social, and resilience indicators have changed over recent decades, and how these changes inform future adaptation strategies under increasing climate and geopolitical pressures.
An interdisciplinary GIS-based framework integrates wildfire occurrence (MODIS MCD64A1), vegetation condition and water stress (MODIS MOD13Q1), Fire Weather Index (FWI) scenarios, and WUI typologies with field-based resilience indicators collected through structured checklists. These indicators capture landscape management practices, settlement patterns, and local response capacity, and are evaluated using multicriteria analysis. The approach is applied to the cultural landscape in Seville (Spain).
Results show that present wildfire risk is strongly conditioned by past transitions such as rural depopulation, reduced grazing, and fuel accumulation since the late 20th century. Climatic indicators alone do not fully explain risk evolution. The analysis highlights context-specific resilience pathways, including the long-term role of landscape stewardship and nature-based solutions, and the importance of institutional capacity and human mobilisation.
By linking historical data trends with evolving resilience indicators, the framework demonstrates how recent past transitions can guide future risk governance, early warning systems, and adaptive strategies for the sustainable preservation of Cultural Landscapes.
How to cite: Bertolin, C., Romao, X., and Moreno Falcon, M.: Learning from Recent History: Reconstructing Wildfire Risk and Resilience Transitions in Cultural Landscapes to Inform Future Climate Challenges, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-20875, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-20875, 2026.
