Fire Law Incentives

What other people think of me is none of my business.

Unless you want to actually achieve something with your words, I suppose.

I'm open to the idea that thinning is a better choice than burning; that's not the main point of my post. I'm arguing that directing most funding into minimizing sparks is not a good outcome, but happens because our approach to fire liability puts it all on whoever starts it.

Simple "policy" proposal: fire vigilante. Someone (who takes pains to keep their identity secret) goes around lighting fires at places/times where they're likely to be relatively-less-bad - e.g. maybe there's a big rainstorm coming in a couple days which is likely to keep the fire under control. (That's just spitballing, I don't really know what the main determinants are of fire controllability.)

Main advantage of this proposal: can be unilaterally implemented. Requires dealing with zero institutional bullshit, zero broken metaincentives, zero coordination problems, zero politics, etc. Essentially no social points-of-failure; the problems-to-be-solved are entirely physical. That also means it could be implemented by a small team or even an individual. I would give it a dramatically higher chance of success than any political approach.

This is an interesting counterpoint (though I'd like to see a model of CO2 cost vs thinning cost if you have one), and it's funny we happen to have such a qualified person on the thread. But your manner is needlessly condescending and - around here - brandishing credentials as a club will seriously undermine you rather than buttressing you. 

I broadly agree with your point here about controlled burning, but I have two comments that I think add worthwhile context to the issue.

First, PG&E has an extremely poor track record when it comes to maintenance on transmission lines. Even with more controlled burning, it's not a good idea to be shooting off sparks in the middle of the dry season. So an optimal balance probably involves both PG&E spending more money on its infrastructure and doing more controlled burning. 

Second, a lot of the deaths and injuries related to fires are the result of California's housing crisis pushing more people into urban-wilderness boundary areas. As development pushes out into more areas of chaparral (which as the Pew article you linked noted, consists of fast-growing shrubs that like to burn and can't really be cleared out over the long-run by controlled burning), you're pretty much guaranteed to have more damage from fire. Removing barriers to housing construction in existing urban areas is a key piece of the puzzle in protecting people from fire. 

The best resource I've found on this topic is a comprehensive investigation into both the nature of the problem and a list of potential solutions, by rationalist blog Nintil:

https://nintil.com/wildfires-california

• How many acres burn every year? Is it getting worse?
• Is this data valid?
• The role of climate change
• Vapor Pressure Deficit
• The historical fire record
• Why do the fires start?
• Natural fires matter: health costs
• The WUI conundrum
• Plot time!
• Who is in charge where?
• Trends elsewhere. Is it getting worse in general?
• Fire suppression, fire exclusion and prescribed fire
• The firefighting trap
• Were Native Americans doing it?
• So is it fire exclusion or climate change?
• Conclusion

https://nintil.com/managing-wildfires

CA has $50 million in its budget for prescribed burns, and the problem is that it's not safe to do them in all areas. Sounds like it's the future of fire control, though. Source

What exactly is the greatest problem of the fire? Is it random people walking in the forest, caught by surprise by a quickly spreading fire? Or is it houses and other things that cannot be moved out of the way of fire, even if you get a warning in advance?

For houses, the solution would be to require an inflammable area of certain size around each settlement. (That is, not around each house individually; you can also surround the entire village.)

For people in the forest, some combination of a warning system (loud alarms in case of fire) and shelters to hide that are easy to find.

It might make sense to cut a few inflammable lines across the forest, so that it doesn't burn all at once.

Hold land-owners liable for fire-damage caused to their abutting neighbors.