IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/climat/v139y2016i3d10.1007_s10584-016-1808-9.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An investigation of future fuel load and fire weather in Australia

Author

Listed:
  • Hamish Clarke

    (University of New South Wales
    Climate and Atmospheric Science Branch, NSW Office of Environment and Heritage
    University Wollongong)

  • Andrew J. Pitman

    (University of New South Wales)

  • Jatin Kala

    (University of New South Wales)

  • Claire Carouge

    (University of New South Wales)

  • Vanessa Haverd

    (CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research)

  • Jason P. Evans

    (University of New South Wales)

Abstract

We present an assessment of the impact of future climate change on two key drivers of fire risk in Australia, fire weather and fuel load. Fire weather conditions are represented by the McArthur Forest Fire Danger Index (FFDI), calculated from a 12-member regional climate model ensemble. Fuel load is predicted from net primary production, simulated using a land surface model forced by the same regional climate model ensemble. Mean annual fine litter is projected to increase across all ensemble members, by 1.2 to 1.7 t ha−1 in temperate areas, 0.3 to 0.5 t ha−1 in grassland areas and 0.7 to 1.1 t ha−1 in subtropical areas. Ensemble changes in annual cumulative FFDI vary widely, from 57 to 550 in temperate areas, −186 to 1372 in grassland areas and −231 to 907 in subtropical areas. These results suggest that uncertainty in FFDI projections will be underestimated if only a single driving model is used. The largest increases in fuel load and fire weather are projected to occur in spring. Deriving fuel load from a land surface model may be possible in other regions, when this information is not directly available from climate model outputs.

Suggested Citation

  • Hamish Clarke & Andrew J. Pitman & Jatin Kala & Claire Carouge & Vanessa Haverd & Jason P. Evans, 2016. "An investigation of future fuel load and fire weather in Australia," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 139(3), pages 591-605, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:139:y:2016:i:3:d:10.1007_s10584-016-1808-9
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-016-1808-9
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-016-1808-9
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10584-016-1808-9?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. 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.
    2. Michael Grose & Paul Fox-Hughes & Rebecca Harris & Nathaniel Bindoff, 2014. "Changes to the drivers of fire weather with a warming climate – a case study of southeast Tasmania," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 124(1), pages 255-269, May.
    3. Tobias Lung & Alessandro Dosio & William Becker & Carlo Lavalle & Laurens Bouwer, 2013. "Assessing the influence of climate model uncertainty on EU-wide climate change impact indicators," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 120(1), pages 211-227, September.
    4. J. Bedia & S. Herrera & D. Martín & N. Koutsias & J. Gutiérrez, 2013. "Robust projections of Fire Weather Index in the Mediterranean using statistical downscaling," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 120(1), pages 229-247, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Eliott, Martyn G. & Venn, Tyron J. & Lewis, Tom & Farrar, Michael & Srivastava, Sanjeev K., 2021. "A prescribed fire cost model for public lands in south-east Queensland," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).

    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. Marc Stéfanon & Nicolas Martin-StPaul & Paul Leadley & Sophie Bastin & Alessandro Dell’Aquila & Philippe Drobinski & Clemente Gallardo, 2015. "Testing climate models using an impact model: what are the advantages?," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 131(4), pages 649-661, August.
    2. Alessandro Dosio & Christopher Lennard & Jonathan Spinoni, 2022. "Projections of indices of daily temperature and precipitation based on bias-adjusted CORDEX-Africa regional climate model simulations," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 170(1), pages 1-24, January.
    3. Xianli Wang & Dan Thompson & Ginny Marshall & Cordy Tymstra & Richard Carr & Mike Flannigan, 2015. "Increasing frequency of extreme fire weather in Canada with climate change," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 130(4), pages 573-586, June.
    4. A. Casanueva & M. Frías & S. Herrera & D. San-Martín & K. Zaninovic & J. Gutiérrez, 2014. "Statistical downscaling of climate impact indices: testing the direct approach," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 127(3), pages 547-560, December.
    5. A. Casanueva & J. Bedia & S. Herrera & J. Fernández & J. M. Gutiérrez, 2018. "Direct and component-wise bias correction of multi-variate climate indices: the percentile adjustment function diagnostic tool," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 147(3), pages 411-425, April.
    6. Josep Peñuelas & Josep Germain & Enrique Álvarez & Enric Aparicio & Pere Arús & Corina Basnou & Cèsar Blanché & Núria Bonada & Puri Canals & Marco Capodiferro & Xavier Carceller & Alexandre Casademunt, 2021. "Impacts of Use and Abuse of Nature in Catalonia with Proposals for Sustainable Management," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-53, February.
    7. Melania Michetti & Mehmet Pinar, 2019. "Forest Fires Across Italian Regions and Implications for Climate Change: A Panel Data Analysis," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 72(1), pages 207-246, January.
    8. Catrinel COTAE, 2015. "ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS A ND REGIONAL COMPETITIVENESS: BRIDGING THE CONCEPTUAL GAP (International Conference "Recent Advances in Economic and Social Research", 13-14 mai 2015, București)," Institute for Economic Forecasting Conference Proceedings 151204, Institute for Economic Forecasting.
    9. CISCAR MARTINEZ Juan Carlos & FEYEN Luc & SORIA RAMIREZ Antonio & LAVALLE Carlo & PERRY Miles & RAES Frank & NEMRY Francoise & DEMIREL Hande & RÓZSAI Máté & DOSIO Alessandro & DONATELLI Marcello & SRI, 2014. "Climate Impacts in Europe. The JRC PESETA II Project," JRC Research Reports JRC87011, Joint Research Centre.
      • Ciscar, Juan-Carlos & Feyen, Luc & Soria, Antonio & Lavalle, Carlo & Raes, Frank & Perry, Miles & Nemry, Françoise & Demirel, Hande & Rozsai, Máté & Dosio, Alessandro & Donatelli, Marcello & Srivastav, 2014. "Climate Impacts in Europe - The JRC PESETA II Project," MPRA Paper 55725, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Marco Turco & Maria-Carmen Llasat & Jost Hardenberg & Antonello Provenzale, 2014. "Climate change impacts on wildfires in a Mediterranean environment," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 125(3), pages 369-380, August.
    11. Sonia Akter & R. Quentin Grafton, 2021. "Do fires discriminate? Socio-economic disadvantage, wildfire hazard exposure and the Australian 2019–20 ‘Black Summer’ fires," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 165(3), pages 1-21, April.
    12. Marion Lestienne & Boris Vannière & Thomas Curt & Isabelle Jouffroy-Bapicot & Christelle Hély, 2022. "Climate-driven Mediterranean fire hazard assessments for 2020–2100 on the light of past millennial variability," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 170(1), pages 1-18, January.
    13. B. Hewitson & J. Daron & R. Crane & M. Zermoglio & C. Jack, 2014. "Interrogating empirical-statistical downscaling," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 122(4), pages 539-554, February.
    14. Jason J. Sharples & Geoffrey J. Cary & Paul Fox-Hughes & Scott Mooney & Jason P. Evans & Michael-Shawn Fletcher & Mike Fromm & Pauline F. Grierson & Rick McRae & Patrick Baker, 2016. "Natural hazards in Australia: extreme bushfire," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 139(1), pages 85-99, November.
    15. Enoch Bessah & Emmanuel A. Boakye & Sampson K. Agodzo & Emmanuel Nyadzi & Isaac Larbi & Alfred Awotwi, 2021. "Increased seasonal rainfall in the twenty-first century over Ghana and its potential implications for agriculture productivity," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(8), pages 12342-12365, August.
    16. J. Bedia & S. Herrera & A. Camia & J. M. Moreno & J. M. Gutiérrez, 2014. "Forest fire danger projections in the Mediterranean using ENSEMBLES regional climate change scenarios," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 122(1), pages 185-199, January.

    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:spr:climat:v:139:y:2016:i:3:d:10.1007_s10584-016-1808-9. 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.springer.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.