资源环境科技发展态势分析平台

On 19 February 2020, the Department released an initial list of threatened ecological communities which have more than 10% of their estimated distribution in areas affected by bushfires in southern and eastern Australia between 1 July 2019 and 11 February 2020.

Preliminary results indicate that of the 84 nationally listed threatened ecological communities:

• Four have more than 50% of their estimated distribution within the fire extent
• Three have more than 30%, but less than 50%, of their estimated distribution within the fire extent
• Thirteen have more than 10%, but less than 30%, of their estimated distribution within the fire extent.
• Another seventeen have some of their estimated distribution within the fire extent.

This analysis compares maps of fire extent from state fire agencies with maps of the estimated distributions of ecological communities protected under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. The maps of estimated distributions of ecological communities include areas where state vegetation mapping identifies vegetation that most closely resembles the description of the ecological communities. The analysis covers bioregions that have been impacted by fires in south-west Western Australia, southern South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, south-eastern Queensland and Tasmania. The analysis area may be refined in future updates. Further information about the analysis is included in the spreadsheet.

These initial results are indicative only and are just the first step in understanding the potential impacts of the bushfires. Some areas were more severely burnt than others. Some ecological communities (e.g. rainforest communities) are naturally more vulnerable to fire than others. Some areas may have now been burnt too intensely and/or too frequently in recent decades to recover without assistance (e.g. particular peat swamps, or communities with plants that only regrow from seed and need the interval bettwen fire events to be long enough for plants to mature and produce seed). In addition, different species within ecological communities vary in their vulnerablity to fire. For example, many eucalypts and other plants may recover well or even benefit from fire (depending on its intensity and frequency), while fire-sensitive plants such as sphagnum moss, many rainforest species or tree-growing orchids within the same ecological communities may be severely impacted, even by cool fires. In other cases, most of the plants within an ecological community may be relatively adapted to fire but larger, older trees that play a critical structural and functional role (e.g. provide nesting hollows) may be lost, and recovery of these components of an ecosystem will be slow. In addition, even in areas where the vegetation may recover quickly, populations of animal species within the threatened ecological communities may have been severely depleted or lost and this will affect the short-term recovery and long-term health of the ecological communities, as animals provide essential functions such as soil turnover, pollination, spore and seed dispersal.

It is also possible that threatened ecological communities with less than 10% of their estimated distribution within the fire extent could be adversely impacted by the loss of significant or high-quality patches (for example, the Littoral Rainforest and Coastal Vine Thickets of Eastern Australia). Equally, some highly fire-sensitive ecological communities mapped with more than 10% within the fire extent may have escaped major impacts (for example, the Robertson Rainforest in the Sydney Basin Bioregion).

On-ground assessments and expert advice will be needed to understand the short and long-term impacts and to help guide priorities for recovery. The Department and the Wildlife and Threatened Species Bushfire Recovery Expert Panel are working with states and territories and other scientific experts to improve the mapping, determine the likely response of these ecological communities and the individual species within them to fire, and to identify critical knowledge gaps. This will help to refine the list of ecological communities of greatest concern, and to guide decisions about emergency interventions that will support the short and medium term survival of affected animals and plants within ecological communities.

Whilst better mapping and expert input is gathered, the starting list of threatened ecological communities that may be most adversely impacted by the 2019-20 fires include those that typically experience infrequent fire, or no fire at all, because these ecosystems are likely to be poorly adapted to fire. These include peatlands, rainforests and wet sclerophyll forests. Consequently, the fire-affected ecological communities of greatest initial concern and highest priority for detailed impact assessment, include the:

• Upland Basalt Eucalypt Forests of the Sydney Basin Bioregion (in the Blue Mountains region of NSW)
• Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone (in the Blue Mountains region of NSW)
• Lowland Rainforest of Subtropical Australia (in north-eastern NSW and South East Queensland)
• Illawarra-Shoalhaven Subtropical Rainforest (in south-eastern NSW)
• Alpine Sphagnum Bogs and Associated Fens (in ACT, NSW and Victoria)
• Eastern Stirling Range Montane Heath and Thicket (in southern WA)
• Littoral Rainforest and Coastal Vine Thickets of Eastern Australia (east coast of Qld, NSW and Vic)

Fires are expected to continue over the summer in parts of Australia and the fire extent mapping will continue to be updated. Further updates will be made to incorporate local and expert knowledge .

In addition, some ecological communities not currently listed under national environmental law may have been sufficiently impacted by fires that they are now more threatened and may require listing for national protection, such as rainforests and wet forests in south-eastern NSW and East Gippsland. The Department and Threatened Species Scientific Committee will be considering potential assessments of these ecological communities in the near future.

Download

• Threatened ecological communities that occur in areas affected by bushfires in southern and eastern Australia from 1 July 2019 and 11 February 2020 (XLSX - 23.59 KB)
• Factsheet - Bushfire impacts and threatened ecological communities (DOCX - 3.19 MB)

To learn more about nationally protected ecological communities:

• http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiversity/threatened/communities
• Species Profile and Threats (SPRAT) Database

On Thursday 13 February 2020, the Department released a National Indicative Aggregated Fire Extent Dataset (NIAFED) on behalf of the Commonwealth Government that aggregates available fire extent data for the 2019/20 fire season, starting on 1 July 2019 and provides a cumulative national view of the areas potentially impacted by fires across Australia.

The NIAFED has been developed rapidly to support the immediate needs of the Department in:

1. quantifying the potential impacts of the 2019/20 bushfires on wildlife, plants and ecological communities, and
2. identifying appropriate response and recovery actions.

The intent was to derive a reliable, agreed, fit for purpose and repeatable national dataset of potentially burnt areas across Australia for the 2019/20 bushfire season.

The dataset has a number of known issues, both in its conceptual design and in the quality of its inputs. These are outlined in the metadata and should be taken into account when interpreting the data and developing any derived analyses. In addition, the 2019/20 bushfire season is ongoing and it can be expected that the fire extent will increase.

The dataset takes the national Emergency Management Spatial Information Network Australia (EMSINA) data service, which is the official fire extent currently used by the Commonwealth, and adds supplementary data from other sources to form a cumulative national view of fire extent. This EMSINA data service shows the current active fire incidents, and the NIAFED shows the total fire extent from 1 July 2019 to the 11 Feb 2020 including planned fires such as back-burning and hazard reduction, as well as fires that might be considered 'normal' for certain parts of Australia.

Not all areas within the fire extent will have been equally impacted by fire. Some areas will have been severely burnt while other areas may have been less impacted. Some areas may not have burnt at all. Information about fire severity and impacts is being analysed and will be validated with on-ground information once it is safe to enter burnt areas.

The Department is using the NIAFED layer, restricted to the Preliminary analysis area map (PDF - 2.18 MB) (PAA), to provide the Wildlife and Threatened Species Bushfire Recovery Expert Panel with indicative current national assessments of environmental values potentially affected by fires since 1 July 2019. This includes plants, animals, ecological communities, heritage areas and important wetlands many of which are listed Matters of National Environmental Significance under the EPBC Act. For example, in the case of EPBC-listed species, the Department’s existing species distribution models are intersected with the restricted PAA fire extent layer to determine the percentage of the known and likely habitat for each species potentially affected by fires. Species distribution data is available via our Find Environmental Data web page.

The NIAFED layer, restricted to the PAA, has informed the development of the List of protected species in bushfire affected areas (XLSX - 74.21 KB) released on 20 January and the Provisional list of animals requiring urgent management intervention (DOCX - 44.88 KB) released on 11 February.

On Thursday 13 February, the Department released maps of the impacts of the 2019-20 Bushfires on three World Heritage Areas: Greater Blue Mountains (NSW), the Gondwana Rainforests of Australia (NSW/Qld) and the Old Great North Road (NSW, part of the Australian Convict Sites World Heritage Area).

The maps indicate that bushfires have had the following impact on these properties:

• Gondwana Rainforests of Australia (NSW, Qld) – approximately 54 per cent affected
• Greater Blue Mountains Area (NSW) - approximately 81 per cent affected
• Old Great North Road (one of the Australian Convict Sites) (NSW) – fire travelled over 99 per cent of the property, preliminary advice is there is limited damage to the values.

Other World Heritage Areas (Budj Bim Cultural Landscape (Vic), Fraser Island (K’gari) (Qld), Wet Tropics (Qld) and Tasmanian Wilderness) have also been affected.

Maps of fire affected World Heritage Areas result from a preliminary spatial area analysis with mapped fire extents from state fire agencies. These initial extents are indicative only, and are just the first step in understanding the potential and actual impacts of the bushfires. The maps represent only the outline of burnt areas and lack information on fire severity in these areas, which may often include patches within them that are very lightly or completely unburnt. Impact assessment will be improved following development of a separate fire severity product.

Bushfire impacts on World Heritage as at 12 February 2020:

Map 1. The Greater Blue Mountains Area and Australian Convict Sites (Old Great North Road) (PDF - 795.39 KB)

Map 2. Gondwana Rainforests of Australia (entire property) (PDF - 514.9 KB)

• Map 2a. Gondwana Rainforests of Australia (northern extent) (PDF - 754.72 KB)
• Map 2b. Gondwana Rainforests of Australia (central extent) (PDF - 680.11 KB)
• Map 2c. Gondwana Rainforests of Australia (southern extent) (PDF - 656.9 KB)

On Tuesday 11 February 2020, the Department released a provisional list of 113 animal species that have been identified by experts as the highest priorities for urgent management intervention over the weeks and months following the 2019-20 bushfires in southern and eastern Australia. Most of these animals have potentially had at least 30% of their range burnt, and many have had substantially more. The provisional list includes 13 bird, 19 mammal, 20 reptile, 17 frog, 5 invertebrate, 22 crayfish and 17 fish species. The priority animals were identified based on the extent to which their range has potentially been burnt, how imperilled they were before the fires (for example, whether they were already listed as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered), and the physical, behavioural and ecological traits which influence their vulnerability to fire.

This analysis builds on the initial spatial analysis of species listed under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 released by the Department of Environment and Energy on 20 Jan 2020. In addition to listed threatened and migratory species protected under the Act, this new analysis also includes other mammal, bird, reptile, frog and crayfish species which are not currently listed as threatened under the Act or by the IUCN but mostly have more than 30% of their range within the burnt areas. The new analysis also incorporates the potential vulnerability of each species to fire, as well as the fire overlap information.

Download Summary Report

• Summary of the provisional list of animals requiring urgent management intervention (DOCX - 44.88 KB)

Download Technical Report and Supporting Information

• Full report on the assessment of animal species vulnerability to fire impacts (DOCX - 2.71 MB)
• Traits used for each group (XLSX - 26.33 KB)
• Bird species trait analysis (XLSX - 49.64 KB)
• Mammal species analysis (XLSX - 50.42 KB)
• Reptiles species analysis (XLSX - 46.62 KB)
• Frogs species analysis (XLSX - 82.04 KB)
• Invertebrates (other than crayfish) species analysis (XLSX - 33.09 KB)
• Crayfish species analysis (XLSX - 2.6 MB)
• Fish species analysis (XLSX - 36.6 KB)

On Monday 20 January 2020, the Department released an initial list of threatened and migratory species which have more than 10% of their known or predicted distribution in areas affected by bushfires in southern and eastern Australia from 1 August 2019 and 13 January 2020.

Preliminary results indicate that:

• 49 listed threatened species have more than 80% of their modelled likely or known distribution within the fire extent
• 65 listed threatened species have more than 50%, but less than 80%, of their modelled likely or known distribution within the fire extent
• 77 listed threatened species have more than 30%, but less than 50%, of their modelled likely or known distribution within the fire extent
• 136 listed threatened species and 4 listed migratory species have more than 10%, but less than 30%, of their modelled likely or known distribution within the fire extent.

The threatened species include 272 plant, 16 mammal, 14 frog, nine bird, seven reptile, four insect, four fish and one spider species. An additional four listed migratory bird species are not listed as threatened.

The threatened species are currently listed as Critically Endangered (31 species), Endangered (110 species) and Vulnerable (186 species) under national environmental law. The listing status of some of these species may need to be reviewed by the Threatened Species Scientific Committee once the impacts of the fires are better understood.

Download 

• Threatened and migratory species known or predicted to occur in areas affected by bushfires in southern and eastern Australia from 1 August 2019 and 13 January 2020 (XLSX - 74.21 KB)
• Preliminary analysis area map (PDF - 2.18 MB)

About the data

This analysis compares maps of fire extent from state fire agencies with maps of the modelled distributions of species protected under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. The species distribution maps include areas where listed species are known to occur, or are predicted to occur based on their habitat preferences. The analysis covers bioregions that have been impacted by fires in south-west Western Australia, southern South Australia, Victoria, southern and eastern New South Wales, south-eastern Queensland and Tasmania. The analysis area may be refined in future updates. Further information about the analysis is included in the spreadsheet.

These initial results are indicative only, and are just the first step in understanding the potential impacts of the bushfires. Some species are more vulnerable to fire than others. Some areas were more severely burnt than others. For example, the Wollemi Pine Wollemia nobilis occurs within the extent of the bushfires and appears in this dataset, but the Department has received reports that the pines were successfully protected from fire. Some species which were not in the path of the fires have been removed from the results, based on advice from state agencies. Further updates will be made to incorporate local and expert knowledge.

The Department is working with states and territories and scientific experts to improve the mapping and determine the likely response of these and other species to fire and understand critical knowledge gaps. This will help to refine the list of species of greatest concern, to guide decisions about emergency intervention to help with the immediate survival of affected animals, plants and ecological communities. Once it is safe to enter fire-affected areas, it may be possible to more accurately assess the severity of the fires and the impacts on individual species. Fires are continuing to burn in parts of Australia and the fire extent mapping will be continue to be updated. New information will feed into future updates. 

Many species not currently listed under national environmental law will have had much of their range affected by the fires and, in some cases that impact may mean that these species have become threatened. The Department will be considering assessments of these species in the near future.

Please note: This analysis only covers the koala populations of Queensland, New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory which are listed as Vulnerable under national environment law, not those in South Australia and Victoria which are not listed.