With many states failing to include cultural heritage in their dedicated wildfire planning frameworks, UC Santa Barbara’s National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) conducted the first ever national assessment of wildfire risk to American cultural heritage. Using the National Register of Historic Places’ listing of 100,117 locations, the study focused on those on land and with specified spatial geometry; eliminating duplicated listings such as ones with shared locations, they found that only 31,939 were not at risk of wildfire damage.
The study also includes an interactive map for the remaining 56,103 locations that they assessed, and cultural professionals can look up the level of risk that their respective institutions and sites can face.
Latest News & Alerts
September 10, 2026
In one week from today, these fantastic speakers and panelists will be joining us at our 20th anniversary conference, in partnership with Washington College of Law's Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property at American University [...]
August 31, 2026
You may have heard the term, “Section 106,” in discussions of U.S. heritage. Perhaps you have seen it in recent headlines. If you’re unfamiliar with this term, “Section 106” refers to a particular part of the [...]
August 28, 2026
We are just three weeks out from our 2026 Annual Conference, "The US Committee of the Blue Shield at Twenty: Two Decades of Protecting Cultural Heritage in Peril," to be held in partnership with the Washington [...]
