IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v13y2022i1d10.1038_s41467-022-30030-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Human-ignited fires result in more extreme fire behavior and ecosystem impacts

Author

Listed:
  • Stijn Hantson

    (Geospatial Data Solutions Center, University of California
    Universidad del Rosario)

  • Niels Andela

    (Cardiff University
    Biospheric Sciences Laboratory, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)

  • Michael L. Goulden

    (University of California)

  • James T. Randerson

    (University of California)

Abstract

California has experienced a rapid increase in burned area over the past several decades. Although fire behavior is known to be closely tied to ecosystem impacts, most analysis of changing fire regimes has focused solely on area burned. Here we present a standardized database of wildfire behavior, including daily fire rate-of-spread and fire radiative power for large, multiday wildfires in California during 2012–2018 using remotely-sensed active fire observations. We observe that human-ignited fires start at locations with lower tree cover and during periods with more extreme fire weather. These characteristics contribute to more explosive growth in the first few days following ignition for human-caused fires as compared to lightning-caused fires. The faster fire spread, in turn, yields a larger ecosystem impact, with tree mortality more than three times higher for fast-moving fires (>1 km day−1) than for slow moving fires (

Suggested Citation

  • Stijn Hantson & Niels Andela & Michael L. Goulden & James T. Randerson, 2022. "Human-ignited fires result in more extreme fire behavior and ecosystem impacts," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-8, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-30030-2
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-30030-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-30030-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-022-30030-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fried, Jeremy S., 2008. "Predicting the effect of climate change on wildfire behavior and initial attack success," Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley, Working Paper Series qt9t2272wx, Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. William L. Baker, 2022. "Is Climate Change Restoring Historical Fire Regimes across Temperate Landscapes of the San Juan Mountains, Colorado, USA?," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-23, September.
    2. Lasse Loepfe & Jordi Martinez-Vilalta & Josep Piñol, 2012. "Management alternatives to offset climate change effects on Mediterranean fire regimes in NE Spain," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 115(3), pages 693-707, December.
    3. Alexandros Dimitrakopoulos & M. Vlahou & Ch. Anagnostopoulou & I. Mitsopoulos, 2011. "Impact of drought on wildland fires in Greece: implications of climatic change?," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 109(3), pages 331-347, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-30030-2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.