Even If You Have Never Seen a Wildfire, You Have Been in One
Regardless of where you are, you have breathed smoke from one. Wildfire is a Global Crisis on your doorstep.
As of late June, 2025, millions of Americans have been impacted by Canadian wildfires so far this year. In May, wildfires were burning across several Canadian provinces, including Saskatchewan and Manitoba, generating plumes of smoke that are drifting southward into the United States.
Hazy skies across the Midwest and East Coast are more than just atmospheric noise — they’re the visible, breathable sign of a larger global emergency. From Minnesota to lower parts of the Midwest, to the Central Atlantic Region and New York air quality shifting to “moderate” and “unhealthy.”
Smoke from wildfires contains PM2.5 — microscopic particles that lodge deep in the lungs and trigger asthma, heart problems, and other serious health issues. Children, the elderly, and people with preexisting conditions are especially at risk. (You can track PM2.5 for your area using the free Windy App on an iPhone.)
The Federal Response
The “Be Smoke Ready” campaign through AirNow.gov, still provides real-time guidance to help Americans protect themselves. The EPA and State Department began reducing this service in March, due to federal budget cuts. But the recommendations stand: these include using HEPA filters, monitoring air quality, and wearing N95 masks when conditions worsen.
But behind these health alerts is a much deeper concern: the ability of the federal government to keep up. While FEMA and USDA have been pillars of wildfire response and recovery, they’re now navigating budget freezes, administrative shakeups, and policy uncertainty. Their long-term ability to support local communities in preparing for and recovering from fire is no longer a guarantee.
White House has been shifting more wildfire responsibility onto states and municipalities — without the funding to match. As resources are pulled back from federal agencies, local governments are expected to shoulder more of the planning, coordination, and mitigation burden. Many simply don’t have the budgets, personnel, or tools to keep pace with this expanding crisis.
Both FEMA and USDA are essential to wildfire response, but their role is shrinking. Athena Intelligence can help cities, counties and towns to prioritize their disaster prevention efforts. Despite fiscal and political headwinds, the USDA and its Forestry Service expects to continue to offer crucial programs for long-term wildfire risk planning, helping local governments fund mitigation and improve community safety.
A New Executive Order, a Familiar Debate
President Donald Trump recently signed a sweeping Executive Order on Wildfire Response, calling for:
- Better use of data for predictive modeling
- Consolidation of federal fire programs
- Loosening restrictions on prescribed burning and fire retardants
- Additional satellite data to support wildfire forecasting
- Greater federal support for state and local mitigation efforts
The order has been praised for its urgency. What is clear is that the conversation has shifted — wildfire is no longer a regional issue. It’s national. It’s global. And it’s political.
Is Rome Burning?
While U.S. agencies scramble to adapt, a global wildfire summit is unfolding at the United Nations FAO headquarters in Rome. The event will bring together scientists, Indigenous leaders, and policymakers to rethink how the world manages fire. Their message is that every community must from reaction to prevention. That means smarter land use, integrated risk planning, and community-centered mitigation — not just response and reaction in an emergency.
FAO Forestry Director Zhimin Wu summed it up: By connecting knowledge, experience and innovation across regions, we are building a global community that is better prepared, more resilient, and more united in the face of growing wildfire challenges.
Why This Matters to You
Whether you live in a wildfire-prone state or on the opposite coast, you are part of this story. Wildfires now affect air quality, energy infrastructure, insurance costs, food supply chains, and public health — even if you live thousands of miles away.
And as climate change accelerates the scale and spread of wildfires, community preparedness is no longer optional.
The decisions we make — from household air filters to federal policy, from state funding and fire safe neighborhoods to global collaboration — will determine how we live with fire in the years ahead.
Athena Intelligence has geospatial intelligence that helps utilities (example), communities (example of Living CWPP), HOAs and Fire Departments prepare for wildfires a year in advance. Offering both a cost effective solution and the ability to address wildfire risk through mitigation, at 5% of the cost of fighting the fire, or 1/10th of a percent of the full cost of a fire, including the public health impacts.
Because it’s no longer a question of if wildfire will affect you.
It’s when.
Athena Intelligence is a data vendor with a geospatial, conditional, profiling tool that pulls together vast amounts of disaggregated wildfire and environmental data to generate spatial intelligence, resulting in a digital fingerprint of wildfire risk.
Our primary clients are electric utilities, especially municipal utilities, community owned cooperative electrical companies and community aggregators. Athena’s data is used to prioritize projects — equipment hardening vs. vegetation management and for discussions with bondholders, consumers and constituents. Athena’s data is currently used in wildfire mitigation plans (WMP) and public safety power shutoffs (PSPS), Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPP), Risk Spend Efficiency reporting to PUCs and other stakeholders.
You can reach out to me at Elizabeth@AthenaIntel.io and follow us on LinkedIn or Energy Central
