Student's killer on parole
Charges after investigation
Hostage was on captor 
Regulating power prices
Gen X is raking it in
LeBlanc laying groundwork
US vetoes UN resolution
$100M Nassar settlement
12 Trump jurors picked
Rates slow green economy
Vicinity hires president,
Record housing starts
Warriors ready for Round 2
Kalamalka Bowl cancelled
Rockets live to fight on
Rihanna's parenting ‘hack’
Tarantino scraps film
Munn talks cancer battle
Fires don't help tourism and we sure as heck don’t enjoy choking on smoke. The views may not be as stellar as they usually are, but fire is natural and necessary.
Today, because of our unnatural management of fire, we are living in one of the oldest and most dangerous forests the western provinces have seen.
If you are able to look at photos of old communities from 100 years ago, it is noticeable that in many instances the forested mountains up to alpine resemble bald prairie.
That is simply because of large scale forest fires that consume massive amounts of forest and there was no mechanized assistance available to suppress the fires.
Today, we live in a veritable tinder box of ageing and dead lumber that ordinarily would have burned off years ago.
Our concerns about logging in watersheds are really man-made concerns because those same watersheds years ago were not immune to fire that wiped out the same trees we struggle to unnaturally preserve today.
So what is the answer?
For years, the debate has been raging in Canadian council chambers, but I think there are only a few possible solutions.
First, municipalities need to listen to forestry experts who would typically advise them to thin the forests in interface ares to remove dead timber and maintain a density much less than it is today.
It naturally has a cost, but the financial burden may well be worth the peace of mind.
Second, create a fire guard and maintain it around susceptible communities. I understand it is not pretty to take a mechanical mulcher and clear a highway around a town or municipality and, in some instances, it is not even possible, but the investment now is probably going to save a lot of money in the future.
The fact remains, however, that the smoke is completely natural.
A very green solution to maintain healthy forests would also be to consider regional based biomass generation plants that burn the excess lumber (renewable energy) to generate power and provide CO2 to the forest that grows and provides a cleaner environment.
This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.
