Climate change and disruptions to global fire activity

Future disruptions to fire activity will threaten ecosystems and human well‐being throughout the world, yet there are few fire projections at global scales and almost none from a broad range of global climate models (GCMs). Here we integrate global fire datasets and environmental covariates to build spatial statistical models of fire probability at a 0.5° resolution and examine environmental controls on fire activity. Fire models are driven by climate norms from 16 GCMs (A2 emissions scenario) to assess the magnitude and direction of change over two time periods, 2010–2039 and 2070–2099. From the ensemble results, we identify areas of consensus for increases or decreases in fire activity, as well as areas…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Awards: 0553768, EF-0553768
• UF
  U.S. Forest Service
• UO
  University of California, Santa Barbara
• NS
  Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada