Fire 🔥 and Technology’s Response

Unless you have been under a rock for a few months, you know that yet another California fire season started months early. The volume and ferocity of these fires seems to grow every year. And recent data that less than 20,000 forest firefighters are working in the state shows that we do not have enough manpower to address these infernos head-on. Rather, we need to use next-gen technology solutions to amplify our efforts in prevention, detection, and immediate response to these fires.

There are a number of companies trying to help solve this problem either through observation, prediction, and response and I wanted to highlight them here today:

Overstory: (Link) Combines AI and satellite data to support vegetation management at utilities. Vegetation encroaching upon poles & wires is a leading ignition cause.

Descartes Labs: (Link) Applies ML to data sources like satellite imagery for better forecasting, monitoring and historical analysis, enabling clients to collect data daily from public and commercial imagery providers and calibrate it for scientific analysis. This satellite imagery can help spot fires at their infancy.

Jupiter Intelligence: (Link) Uses AI and proprietary climate modeling techniques to deliver asset level predictions on peril impact: fire, wind, heat and water perils, from 1 hour ahead to 50 years. (Note: Energize is an investor here!) The company also received a Moore grant to build fire predictions for California public entities.

Zonehaven: (Link) Combines critical data and modeling capabilities to help first responders and communities understand, minimize and respond to an emergency. As fires become more commonplace around our towns and cities, we will need to have better response and evac plans.

Of course, a top long-term priority for addressing climate change is to continue to invest in new tech that is decarbonizing our power and mobility sectors. In the meantime, though, we must invest in adaptation technologies to live alongside changes in our environment.

Who else is leveraging new technology to address the fire problem?

** ADDING NAMES SHARED FROM TWITTER NETWORK **

Terrafuse.ai (Link) Actionable climate intelligence for a resilient earth

FirePerimiter.com (Link) Situational intelligence for public safety based on collaborative, real-time disaster visualization

GeoSite Inc: (Link) Geosite is a cloud-based geospatial data marketplace with integrated spatial data management and collaboration.

BuzzSolutions: (Link) Safeguarding the world’s energy infrastructure through: “Artificial Intelligence, Actionable Insights and Predictive Analytics for Power Line and Grid Inspections”

NearSpace Labs: (Link) Near Space Labs provides timely wide-scale imagery from the stratosphere at down-to-earth prices.