While the fires continue to ravage neighborhoods in Los Angeles, many voices – including the American president – claim that the intensity of the fires is linked to environmental protection policies implemented in California: water conservation, fish protection threatened, greenhouse gas emission controls. But for experts and authorities, the extent of the damage can be explained by extreme weather conditions and poorly prepared infrastructure.
Since the first fires broke out on January 7, 2025, the toll of fires has continued to worsen in Los Angeles. As of January 23, they had ravaged more than 16,000 hectares, and at least 27 people had lost their lives. Dozens more are still missing.
How can we explain the intensity of this episode and the seriousness of the damage? If scientists warn of extreme weather conditions, on social networks, many Internet users point the finger at the environmental policies implemented in the State of California in recent years.
The new US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, powerful owner of X, have themselves named several environmental conservation projects as responsible for the intensity of the fires in California (archived here).
Inaugural on January 20, 2025, Donald Trump immediately signed numerous decrees, with the aim of transforming the country, in particular by withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement and by ordering federal and environmental agencies “to carry more water” in Southern California (archived here).
“My administration would have dedicated enormous quantities of water from melted snow and rain“, explained Donald Trump on January 20 in his memorandum, in reference to these historic fires (archived here).
On January 22, he discussed the dismantling of Fema, the federal agency responsible for natural disasters, criticizing the management of the ongoing fires in California (archived here).
AFP has examined several misleading or false claims regarding California’s environmental policies and their possible impacts.
The endangered fish
On social networks, many Internet users have questioned the protection measures for the Delta smelt, a small fish threatened with extinction (archived here), which lives several hundred kilometers north of Los Angeles.
In 2024, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, a federal agency responsible for fish and wildlife conservation, listed this species as endangered, due to “significant decline” of its population in the San Francisco Bay estuary in recent years (archived here).
The efforts made to protect this fish were denounced by Donald Trump on January 8 on his Truth Social network, then in his memorandum, entitled “Putting people before fish“. According to the American president, California Governor Gavin Newsom would have wanted “protect a useless fish (…) without worrying about the inhabitants of California“.
Regulations to protect endangered fish can impact pumping levels in rivers, and therefore water storage and transport infrastructure.
However, the link between these measures and the fires is “implausible“, given that”there is no shortage of water in the reservoirs supplied by Delta water” (Sacramento-San Joaquin), Caleb Scoville, assistant professor of environmental sociology at Tufts University in Massachusetts (archived here), explained to AFP on January 14.
Comments confirmed by Kaith Kearns, researcher specializing in water, fires and climate change at the University of Arizona (archived here). Questioned by AFP on January 14, she assured that “the water supply in California is quite large right now“.
Water supply
Residents of the Pacific Palisades neighborhood, particularly affected by the fires, were outraged by the fact that some fire hydrants were dry.
On January 10, California Governor Gavin Newsom opened an independent investigation (archived link) into the low pressure in these hydrants, as well as the reported lack of water in the Santa Ynez Reservoir.
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power said the reservoirs were supplied via aqueducts and pumping underground, but the biggest challenge was then deploying large quantities of water quickly.
When firefighters began battling the flames, demand was up to four times higher than normal usage, Janisse Quiñones, general director of the Department of Water and Power (archived here), explained during of a press conference on January 8.
She said it was difficult to bring water from other parts of the city, partly because of the size of the supply lines, but also because the water had to be pumped in the direction of the climb.
“Tanks were full and usable before the Palisades fire arrived“, assured Christine McMorrow, communications manager for CAL FIRE (archived here), the Department of Forestry and Fire Fighting. “But when so much water has to be extracted at once, the tanks or basins cannot fill quickly enough to cope.“, she explained to AFP on January 16.
Data from the California Department of Water Resources indicates that most of the state’s reservoirs are full to significant levels for this time of year, and were when the fires started, as shown in the image below. below, representing the situation as of January 7 (archived here).
-“This is particularly true for reservoirs located in southern California, particularly in fire-affected areas.”Professor Caleb Scoville told AFP on January 14.
It is therefore false to claim that Governor Gavin Newsom blocked the flow of water from the north. Los Angeles’ water supply is mainly provided via aqueducts and canals originating from different river basins, located further east.
Mr. Newsom called these new narratives, used repeatedly by Donald Trump, “crazy fantasies“, in an interview given on January 14 (archived here).
Additionally, authorities also claimed that even if more water had been available, it would have been impossible to contain the initial outbreaks of fire.
“I will be clear: we could have had a lot more water, with these gusts of wind, we would not have been able to stop these fires“, estimated Chad Augustin, the Pasadena fire chief, on January 8 (archived here).
Deployment of emergency vehicles
On the social network X, users also claimed that dozens of fire trucks from Oregon were stopped and detained to control their carbon emissions.
The State of California has effectively launched a heavy-duty vehicle emissions compliance monitoring program to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. However, emergency vehicles, such as fire trucks, are not subject to these controls, as the California Air Resources Council states on its website (archived here).
Oregon Fire Department spokesman John Hendricks confirmed to AFP on January 16 that claims that Oregon fire crews had been stopped were false.
“We mobilized 21 teams and 370 firefighters. We sent 75 trucks, and 30 tankers“, Mr. Hendricks clarified. “There were no blockages or stops for checks“, he assured AFP.
The Oregon Fire Department had already denied this false information aboutthat no truck had been stopped” (archived here).
Emergency vehicles, however, underwent a routine safety inspection by the California Fire Department, which made necessary repairs before deployment (archived here).
“The fire season is now all year round”
According to meteorologists, a dry winter combined with strong Santa Ana winds created optimal conditions for fires to spread (archived here).
“It is highly unusual to have fires like these, attributed to California’s very dry winter after a particularly dry summer, and the Santa Ana winds.” says Toddi Steelman, a fire expert at Duke University (archived here).
“The fire season is now all year round“, she assured on January 8 (archived here).
Climate scientist Katharine Hayoe also said the situation had been made worse by “exceptionally dry and windy conditions, leading to fires fueled by climate change, burning faster and wider than before” (archived here).
Many infrastructures and public services in Los Angeles “were not prepared for the scale of the disaster“, explained the scientist to AFP on January 9.
For Jay Lund, professor of engineering at the University of California-Davis (archived here), recent events “have clearly exceeded firefighting capabilities and their small scale, perfected in urban areas, giving a false sense of security“.
As the climate evolves, and variations between extremely dry and extremely humid conditions increase, new methods of construction and urban planning must be considered in areas vulnerable to fires, Mr. Lund said on January 14.
Since the start of the Los Angeles fires, AFP has examined numerous false information circulating online, such as here, here, or here.
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