A new study suggests that Canadian forests are increasingly at risk from severe wildfires, highlighting the urgent need to proactively mitigate the increased threat posed by climate change.
The study led by Canadian researchers and published in the journal “Science” examined the severity of fires from 1981 to 2020.
Co-author Xianli Wang, a scientist with the Canadian Forest Service, says there were on average two additional days suitable for high-severity fires between 2000 and 2020, compared to the previous two decades.
Two days may not seem like much, but it only took a few hours for last summer’s devastating wildfire in Jasper, Alberta, to expand to about 60 square kilometers.
The study suggests that the main environmental driver of fire severity is dry fuel, such as twigs and leaves, while the effect of hot, dry and windy weather conditions was felt more in northern regions.
The largest increases in the number of days suitable for severe fires were recorded in an area north of Quebec and another covering the Northwest Territories, northwest Alberta and northeastern Columbia. British.
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