Alberta is investing in artificial intelligence in an effort to predict where a wildfire may ignite before it happens, a move its tech partners say could save up to $5 million a year.

Ed Trenchard, provincial wildfire management specialist, does long-term planning with communities and industry on how to mitigate risk, and also works on the ground.

SA国际影视传媒淲hen we have large escaped fires like we had this year, I actually go out to the fires and plan where resources are going (in order) to fight the fires, and inform communities of potential evacuations,SA国际影视传媒� he said.

SA国际影视传媒淚n the past and currently, we know what we have for fuels (like trees), we know whatSA国际影视传媒檚 available to burn, and we know through our weather forecasting how bad the weather is going to be.SA国际影视传媒�

Federal officials have said Canada has seen an unprecedented wildfire season this year, with nearly 179,000 square kilometres burned as of late September, versus the 10-year average of about 2,700 for that time of year. In Alberta this year, fires forced the evacuation of several communities, including Edson and Drayton Valley in the west and Fort Chipewyan in the northeast.

Trenchard said looking at the interaction between the fuels and the weather SA国际影视传媒渒ind ofSA国际影视传媒� predicts the risk to an area.

SA国际影视传媒淭he problem that weSA国际影视传媒檝e been faced with is we donSA国际影视传媒檛 know where the next fire is going to start,SA国际影视传媒� he said.

AlbertaSA国际影视传媒檚 wildfire agency has partnered with software company AltaML to try to predict where fires are going to start the day before they happen so they can better plan resources.

The partnership is part of a larger grants program called GovLab, which was founded as a collaboration between AltaML, the Alberta government and Mitacs, a non-profit innovation hub.

SA国际影视传媒淚tSA国际影视传媒檚 a next-day fire-likelihood forecast,SA国际影视传媒� said Graham Erickson, senior lead machine learning developer with AltaML, which uses MicrosoftSA国际影视传媒檚 Azure AI technology to build its own software.

Erickson said wildfire officers put people, equipment, aircraft and other resources in place as part of pre-suppression efforts in case of a fire breakout.

SA国际影视传媒淪o every day, they have duty officers whose job is to figure out for the next day, what pre-suppression resources they have on retainer,SA国际影视传媒� Erickson said. SA国际影视传媒淚n the past, this was purely based on fire severity.SA国际影视传媒�

He said Alberta has historically had a SA国际影视传媒渞isk averseSA国际影视传媒� culture and would spend a lot of money on resources that donSA国际影视传媒檛 end up being used, costing $2 million to $5 million a year. The new software could change that, he said.

SA国际影视传媒淚tSA国际影视传媒檚 developed with machine learning, which is a subtype of AI technology that basically analyzes tons of data that theySA国际影视传媒檝e collected over the past couple of decades about fires in the province,SA国际影视传媒� Erickson said.

Trenchard said SA国际影视传媒渨orking with AltaML has given us an opportunity to bridge the knowledge gap from an experienced person to maybe a less experienced duty officer able to have that tool available to them.SA国际影视传媒�

The AI software provides additional information to duty officers, enabling them to make crucial decisions more quickly.

Trenchard said Alberta keeps an intensive database going back decades of where fires have started, what the weather conditions were at the time, what type of trees were burning and how the fire started.

SA国际影视传媒淯sing that history, combined with weather forecasting, thatSA国际影视传媒檚 what the model is using essentially,SA国际影视传媒� he said. SA国际影视传媒淎nd itSA国际影视传媒檚 building on itself, so every calendar year, we dump that last calendar year of data into the black box of AI to improve the prediction over time.SA国际影视传媒�

Trenchard said right now, the predictions have shortcomings in location accuracy.

SA国际影视传媒淭he future vision of this is actually going to be like a pinpoint location on a map for where the next fires are going to start tomorrow, and then we will place resources close or as close as we can to those predictions.SA国际影视传媒�

John Weigelt, national technology officer at Microsoft Canada, said the company is partnering with a number of governments and organizations across the country to adopt AI. He said this is an attempt to solve SA国际影视传媒渢he big challenges that weSA国际影视传媒檙e facing in Canada.SA国际影视传媒�

Weigelt added Microsoft has partnered with the City of Kelowna in the B.C. Interior in a similar capacity to try and battle local forest fires.

SA国际影视传媒淭his technology has matured dramatically over time, and people have got more comfortable with how to deploy it,SA国际影视传媒� he said.