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
November 5, 2026
An edited volume titled, A NATO Agenda for Cultural Security: Countering Russia’s Exploitation of Cultural Heritage in Ukraine and Beyond, is now available online from IOS Press. The open access volume, edited by Tess Davis, Anastasiia Oleksii, [...]
November 2, 2026
Last week, we circulated the second letter delivered to Congress by a coalition of more than 1,000 organizations calling for the defeat of S. 5653, the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026. Section 106, the [...]
October 29, 2026
In the middle of August, more than 600 organizations joined a coalition to protect Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, vital regulations which require federal agencies to consider how federally funded, licensed, permitted, or [...]
