The frequency and magnitude of extreme wildfires appear to have doubled in the last 20 years, and the six most extreme years for these events have occurred since 2017, according to a study published in Nature Ecology & Evolution.
In recent years, severe wildfire events have broken records and made global headlines. These fires cause loss of life, buildings, livestock, wildlife and habitat and cause billions of dollars in damage. Thousands more deaths have been attributed to associated air pollution. However, our understanding of trends in these types of fires is limited.
To test whether wildfires are increasing in frequency and/or magnitude, Calum Cunningham and colleagues at the University of Tasmania used satellite data from 2003 to 2023 to identify active hot spots and calculate the summed intensity of a fire event, rather than at a single time and place. The authors found that Energetically extreme wildfires have more than doubled in frequency and magnitude over the past 20 years and that the six most extreme years occurred since 2017. They also found that the Nearctic and Australasia/Oceania were the most affected by the extreme events, and the increase was mainly driven by more intense fires in temperate forests of conifers and boreals, also in North America and Russia. Cunningham and colleagues suggest this may be linked to increased aridity in these forests in recent years due to climate change.
The authors conclude that the results indicate that The increase in the frequency and magnitude of extreme fires highlights the need to adapt to a climate conducive to these events.
