Piedmont, AL
How exposed is Piedmont to wildfire?
Piedmont's 3,062 buildings earn a 86th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Piedmont at the 89th percentile, close to its 86th-percentile risk score.
Where Piedmont's buildings actually sit
Most of Piedmont's buildings (63.2%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
How Piedmont compares
Piedmont scores 86th nationally and 90th within Alabama — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Piedmont ranks 4,494 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 5,338 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alabama alone, it ranks 61 of 592 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alabama on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Piedmont's very high rating (86th percentile) puts it among the places where the national carrier-pullback trend is most relevant — not a guarantee of a coverage problem, but a reason to shop rather than assume.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Piedmont (63.2% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
Where Piedmont's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Piedmont's 4,494-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Piedmont's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.