What has been learned during the course of this project is that fire is an entity which is very difficult to define, and in order to properly model it, many many variables must be incorporated. To date, no all inclusive fire model has ever been created. Although many groups such as the U.S. Forest Service have attempted to accurately model how a fire flows in a forest, no one has yet created a model which incorporates all the variables that can be observed in the real world.
Due to the limited time period in which to create this model, the team chose to model fuel types and wind vectoring because they believed that those two variables, in particular, affected the flow of fire the most. Although the model does not take into account many of the variables associated with fire, those few variables which have been modeled, have created an accurate replication of how a fire flows n a realistic environment. The variables which have been incorporated significantly advance the program beyond the progress that was achieved last year.. Many concepts which were intangible when the project was first begun have been defined and will be essential in future fire modeling research. The most important of these is the distinction between fire flow and heat flow.

The Heat Flow Model
The incorporation of Newton’s Law of Cooling and Fourier’s Law of Conduction account for convection and conduction, and the introduction of these two laws into the project gives the project a strong foundation. However, the radiation model has eluded the modeling process. The Stefan-Boltzmann Law of Radiation accounts for only fire radiation given off by heat and not the chemical reaction of fire. Fire’s main method of heat creation is radiation. Therefore, the heat flow model requires more development, most specifically the radiation model. The actual fire model is also affected, because if heat cannot be properly defined, then the effect of temperature upon fire cannot be properly modeled.

The Wind Model
The wind vectoring process makes logical sense. Fire flow can be treated as a vector of the proportion of the wind speed and its direction and the spread of the fire across an area. However, this has not been validated yet and can only remain suspicion.

The Fuel Model
The fuel model generalizes many factors. It breaks the forest and its individual traits into a square grid with meters as its base unit. This generalization makes fire flow less accurate. Yet, you cannot model the forest exactly in a computer program. There are factors that cannot be perfectly defined no matter how precise you become.
The division of the patches’ fuel into wet and dry fuel also pulls the fire flow process from the mark. Yet, it is this simplification that gives the project a basis, flawed, but workable, upon which it can solve the important part, the fire flow. The program can then easily characterize wet and dry fuels.

The Fire Flow Model
The fire flow process is the biggest success of this project. The Elliptical Fire Theory gives the program a validated base upon which to build. As more variables are added to the model, one must know the beneficial or detrimental effects of the variable upon fire spread to find the growth of the fire. This is a standard benchmark that depends upon all the incorporated variables the fire will travel a certain distance at a certain degree.

Variables and Empirical Data
Fire is never exposed to perfect circumstances. In the real world, fire is affected by many variables, some yet to be defined. This project attempted to take into account three specific variables that effect fire flow; heat, fuel type, and wind. However, to determine these variables, other variables must be known, and eventually integrated. For example, it is known fire spreads at different rates over different fuels, but it remains unknown exactly at what rate per fuel type. Empirical data is needed to increase the accuracy of this project. There are many variables which could become constants with more research and experimentation.
Though this program may not account for all environmental factors, it does provide a basis for later addition of these factors when the variables’ effects are known a can be integrated into the program.

Validation
Looking back, this project has come a long way since last year. The foundation of the Elliptical Fire Theory has evolved into the modeling of a fire. This project and the program cannot be disproven, yet cannot be proven at their current state. This is suggested by the research and data collected.
This program follows basic fire expansion. In a future venture however, further validation of this project needs more real-world data. This data must then be collected, compared, and the program adjusted to take into account realistic, imperfect fire conditions. Possibly a static test could be done to compare the effects of a real forest fire against the program’s version of the fire. Or perhaps this program could be compared against FARSITE. The basis of validation in this project was to validate the Elliptical Fire Theory by burning materials in relatively perfect conditions. Although in tune with the program, in wildfires the conditions of the forest are not perfect. For this project to be of any practical use, the program must be validated against more than perfect conditions.

Overview
This program is the basis upon which a more advanced program can be built. Because there are so many variables that must be taken into account in order to ensure a true fire flow program, only a select few have been incorporated as discussed above. In the future, many more important fire variables must be incorporated in order to ensure an even more accurate fire flow program. In addition, further verification will be attempted using actual fire data collected by the United States Forest Service and other organizations. The team will attempt to verify that, based on the given environmental conditions, the program would flow in the same manner and speed evidenced by a past fire. If the program can be validated by this method using additional variables, then a true to life fire model, which may be even more accurate than current fire models, could be created for use in the real world. Fire is a devastating force, and by understanding it, and using the wondrous technology around us to model and predict it, we may one day live in a world in which forest fires no longer threaten our homes and our lives.