Scientists find a surprising result on global wildfires: Theyre actually burning less land
Scientists find a surprising result on global wildfires: Theyre actually burning less land
29 June 2017
published by https://www.washingtonpost.com
Global – Around the world, the amount of land being burned in wildfires is declining and human activity is largely the cause, scientists say. According to a new study, out Thursday in the journal Science, global burned area has declined by nearly a quarter in the past two decades. The surprising decrease occurred largely as agriculture has expanded and intensified throughout the world, taking over many of the natural areas where wildfires commonly occur.
While many recent studies have suggested that climate change will cause longer and more intense fire seasons in certain parts of the world recent research has suggested that its been making wildfires in the western United States more intense for decades the new study indicates that human land-use changes also have a significant impact on when and where fires occur. In many places, the influence of human land use is simply just stronger than the climate signal, said the new studys lead author, Niels Andela, a research scientist at NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center.
This work highlights how humans can shape global fire regimes, David Bowman, a global wildfire expert and professor of environmental-change biology at the University of Tasmania who was not involved with the research, said in an email. Realistically factoring in humans into global climate change and global carbon dynamic projections has always been difficult, and this work demonstrates that this difficulty must be more thoroughly addressed to create plausible scenarios of Earth system change.
The researchers came to their conclusions by analyzing satellite data on burned area across the planet between 1998 and 2015. During this period, they found that burned area declined about 24 percent an enormous area, according to Andela with much of the decrease occurring in the worlds grasslands and savannas.
The researchers also used a model to investigate the effect of factors such as precipitation and human activities on the global fire patterns. They found that precipitation had little influence on the long-term decline in global burned area but human activity, and particularly agriculture, was a strong driver.
In some places, particularly tropical forest landscapes, the researchers found that agricultural activity was actually associated with an increase in fires, probably as a result of agricultural waste burning or deforestation to make room for cropland. But these increases were outweighed by the areas where agriculture was associated with a reduction in burned area, mainly in grassland and savanna landscapes, where theres less biomass available to burn and where fire may be less necessary as a land-clearing or management tool.
The researchers found that fire reductions were particularly pronounced in places with greater socioeconomic development and higher investment in their pastures and croplands. Wealthier areas may be less inclined to risk their crops, livestock, homes and infrastructure by using fire as a management tool, the researchers suggest, and the people living in these places also may be less likely to accept the poor air quality caused by smoke from wildfires. In fact, they may begin to employ fire suppression tactics to prevent natural wildfires from occurring.
These global fire reductions may come with pros and cons, the researchers note. For one thing, fire is a natural element of many ecosystems life cycles, helping to recycle nutrients, regulate competition among types of plants and make space for new growth. So suppressing wildfires can actually have a negative impact on a landscapes vegetation and biodiversity.
On the other hand, the researchers note that a reduction in fire also comes with a decline in the carbon emissions it produces, which could be helpful in the fight against climate change. That said, theres the potential that the carbon released by the land conversion and agricultural expansion driving these declines may actually offset the reduction in fire emissions. A great deal more research will be necessary before scientists can say for sure how all of these changes are affecting the global carbon cycle, Andela said.
And Bowman, the University of Tasmania scientist, also pointed out that this study should not be construed as suggesting the global wildfire crisis is being resolved. Even while burned area is declining on a global scale, human management techniques such as starting fires where they dont belong and suppressing them where they might otherwise naturally occur may actually be priming many landscapes for more-extreme wildfires in the future. Fire suppression, in particular, can sometimes lead to an overabundance of dry fuel in certain areas, and these unburned spaces may eventually burn ferociously under hotter and drier conditions expected by climate change, Bowman suggested.
Andela also added that overall I wouldnt describe our findings as being a positive thing for the Earth system or global ecosystems. The spread of agriculture and the decrease in natural burning, particularly in grassland ecosystems worldwide, is indicative of the profound changes taking place in these natural landscapes, he said.
The disappearance of fire from those ecosystems really symbolizes how we are using these last wildernesses of the Earth, he said.
The forest fire, which started on the night of June 24 and still smoldering in Spain’s southwestern region of Huelva, burned a total of 8,486 hectares, the Andalusian Regional Government said on Wednesday. Environmental spokesman for Andalusia, Jose Fiscal, confirmed the damage on his Twitter account. Over 2,000 people had had to be evacuated from hotels and campsites on the perimeter of the fire, he said. He added that the perimeter established around the fire was actually 10,900 hectares, but within that perimeter, 2,414 hectares of woodland were still intact. The fire damaged two protected areas: 6,761 hectares of Donana National Park, which has UNESCO protected status and is home to around 400 different species such as the threatened Iberian Lynx and Iberian Eagle, and 17 hectares of Laguna de Palos y Madres Nature Park. The Andalusian government believed that had it not been for the work of fire fighters, who at the height of the blaze numbered around 500, the damage would have been far worse for the 43,225 hectares of woods and scrubland. According to the regional government, temperatures were around 40 degrees Celsius when the fire began, with a wind-speed of between 30 and 40 km per hour (km/h) and gusts of up to 90 km/h at night, which helped propagate the flames and made it impossible to use aircraft or helicopters to fight the fire. A total of 50 firemen remain in the zone to continue the work of damping down and to ensure there are no flare ups, while investigations continue into the cause of the blaze. Authorities have not ruled out a human cause.
Read full text at: http://eng.belta.by/society/view/spanish-forest-fire-burns-over-8400-hectares-in-and-around-national-park-102857-2017/
If you use BelTAs materials, you must credit us with a hyperlink to eng.belta.by.Tropical peat swamp forests, which once occupied large swaths of Southeast Asia and other areas, provided a significant “sink” that helped remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But such forests have been disappearing fast due to clear-cutting and drainage projects making way for plantations. Now, research shows peatlands face another threat, as climate change alters rainfall patterns, potentially destroying even forested peatlands that remain undrained.
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-06-peatlands-dwindling-losses.html#jCpTropical peat swamp forests, which once occupied large swaths of Southeast Asia and other areas, provided a significant “sink” that helped remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But such forests have been disappearing fast due to clear-cutting and drainage projects making way for plantations. Now, research shows peatlands face another threat, as climate change alters rainfall patterns, potentially destroying even forested peatlands that remain undrained.
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-06-peatlands-dwindling-losses.html#jCp
