Around the world, wildfires are increasing in intensity, frequency, and destruction — yet innovation to detect and manage wildfire events has not kept pace with the mounting challenges. Wildfires often start in hard to- reach areas and are fueled by climate change-related extreme weather events, such as severe droughts, extreme winds, and heatwaves. As more people move into wildfire-prone areas, the risk of ignition and impacts on human life and infrastructure increase tremendously. Current detection and delivery of resources are often too slow, insufficiently coordinated, and not precise enough, leading to delayed responses and risk of wildfires becoming destructive.
XPRIZE Wildfire is a 4-year, $11 million competition incentivizing the innovation of firefighting technologies that will end destructive wildfires so that humanity and beneficial wildfire can safely co-exist. The prize aims to transform current wildfire management approaches through the development of new technologies that can rapidly and accurately detect, characterize, and respond to wildfires before they become destructive.
The $5M Autonomous Wildfire Response Track will transform how fires are managed and fought. The winning team will have 10 minutes to autonomously detect and suppress a high-risk fire in a 1000 Km2, environmentally challenging area, leaving any decoy fires untouched.
Additionally, the $1M Lockheed Martin Accurate Detection Intelligence Bonus Prize will be awarded to one or more eligible teams participating in the Autonomous Wildfire Response track whose competition entries successfully demonstrate accurate, precise, and rapid detection.
These innovations seek a 4x gain in current best practices— shortening the time between detection and rapid response to inform management practices and minimize negative impacts.