California, Texas Top Western States for Extreme Risk of Wildfire Damage

California and Texas rank first and second for the total number of residential properties at an extreme risk for wildfire damage, according to data provider CoreLogic.

The reasons for that include: both states have large populations and equally large numbers of residential properties; and both have a large concentration of existing homes and increasing building activity in the area known as the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI).

In a recently released Wildfire Risk report, CoreLogic defines the WUI “as an area where dense urban development lies adjacent to undeveloped wildland areas.” The data provider points out that while homes built in the WUI may be structurally similar to properties located closer to the urban core “their close proximity to the wildland area creates conditions that could lead to exposure from ember showers that could result in structure damage or destruction.”

The Wildfire Risk report designates 1.8 million single-family homes across 13 Western states, including Texas and Oklahoma, as being at “Extreme” or “High” risk of wildfire damage, representing a combined total reconstruction cost value of nearly $500 billion.

The study released in late October assigns risk levels to individual properties based on a score ranging from 1 to 100 as “Extreme,” “High,” “Moderate” and “Low.” Properties with the highest exposure to wildfire risk are scored between 81 and 100, and “are the most likely to suffer damage should a fire occur,” according to the report.

California and Texas rank first and second for the total number of homes in the “Extreme” risk category.

California tops the list for total number of properties in the “Extreme” and “High” risk categories with 645,445 properties at risk. Texas (532,317) and Colorado (195,601) follow.

California also has the highest reconstruction value in each of the top two risk levels at more than $250 billion, followed by Texas and Colorado at nearly $94 billion and $54 billion.

A total of 893,333 homes in the 13 states analyzed were found to be in the Extreme risk category. They have a collective estimated reconstruction cost value (RCV) of $218,758,051,071.

The Southern Rockies/South Central U.S. region — Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas — had the most properties in the Extreme risk category: 418,490. But the Desert/Pacific Southwest, which includes California, leads in terms of total RCV for homes in the Extreme category — more than $99 billion. The Southern Rockies/South Central region totals more than $83 billion in RCV, with Texas in the lead.

Another 919,392 homes in the 13 states have a wildfire risk score between 61 and 80, which places them in the category for High risk of wildfire damage. CoreLogic estimates the homes in the High risk category have a combined RCV of more than $281,041,584,567.

A record number of acres — more than 10,000 — burned in 2015. In its Wildland Fire Summary and Statistics Annual Report 2015, the National Interagency Coordination Center shows a total of 4,636 structures were destroyed by wildfires in 2015.

Both the NICC and CoreLogic report a trend of fewer fires but more acres burned annually in the past decade.

Insurance Journal West Editor Don Jergler contributed to this report.

Topics California Catastrophe Natural Disasters Texas Wildfire Colorado