While fires continue to ravage from Los Angeles districts, many votes – which in the American president – claim that the intensity of the fires is linked to the environmental protection policies carried out in California.
Water conservation, threatened fish protection, greenhouse gas emission controls. But for experts and authorities, the extent of the damage is explained by extreme weather conditions and poorly prepared infrastructure.
Since the first starts of fire on January 7, 2025, the results of the fires have 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 of others are still missing.
How to explain the intensity of this episode and the severity of the damage? If scientists alert on extreme weather conditions, on social networks, many Internet users are pointing out the environmental policies implemented in the State of California in recent years.
New American president Donald Trump and Elon Musk, a powerful owner of X, themselves appointed several environmental conservation projects as responsible for the intensity of fires in California (archived here).
Invested on January 20, 2025, Donald Trump immediately signed very many decrees, with the aim of transforming the country, in particular by withdrawing Paris climate agreement and by ordering the federal and environmental agencies “to transport more water“In southern California (archived here).
“My administration would have dedicated huge amounts of water from melted snow and rain“, Explained Donald Trump on January 20 in his memorial, in reference to these historic fires (archived here).
On January 22, he spoke of the dismantling of FEMA, the federal agency responsible for natural disasters, criticizing the management of current fires in California (archived here).
AFP has examined several misleading or false allegations concerning Californian environmental policies and their possible impacts.
Threatened fish
On social networks, many Internet users have implicated the protection measures of the Delta hawk, a small fish threatened with extinction (archived here), which evolves several hundred kilometers north of Los Angeles.
In 2024, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, a federal agency responsible for the conservation of fish and wildlife, classified this endangered species, because of the “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 “Pass people before fish“According to the American president, the governor of California Gavin Newsom would have liked”Protect a useless fish (…) without worrying about the inhabitants of California“.
Regulations to protect threatened fish can impact pumping levels in rivers, and therefore the storage and water transport infrastructure.
However, the link between these measures and the fires is “incredible“, given that”There is no water shortage in the reservoirs supplied by the Delta water“(Sacramento-San Joaquin), told AFP Caleb Scoville, assistant professor of environmental sociology at the University of Tofts in Massachusetts (archived here), January 14.
Remarks 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 supply of water to California is quite important at the moment“.
Water supply
Residents of the Pacific Palisades district, particularly affected by fires, were scandalized by the fact that certain fires were dry.
On January 10, California Governor Gavin Newsom opened an independent investigation (archived link) concerning low pressure in these fire mouths, as well as the lack of water reported in the Santa Ynez tank.
The Los Angeles Water and Electricity Department explained that the tanks were supplied via aqueducts and pumping underground, but that the greatest difficulty was then to deploy large quantities of water quickly.
When the firefighters began to fight the flames, the request was up to four times the normal use, explained Janisse Quiñones, Director General of the Department of Water and Electricity (archived here), during a press conference on January 8.
She clarified that it was difficult to send water from other places in the city, especially because of the size of the supply lines, but also of the fact that the water had to be pumped in the climb.
“The tanks were filled and usable before the arrival of the fire in Palisades“, assured her side Christine McMorrow, communications officer of Cal Fire (archived here), the department of forests and the fight against fires.”But when you have to extract as much water at once, tanks or basins cannot fill up quickly enough to cope“She told AFP on January 16.
-California water resources department indicate that most state tanks are filled at high levels for this period of the year, and were when the fires started, as shown in the image Ci -Dis, representing the situation on January 7 (archived here).
“This is particularly true for reservoirs located in the south of California, especially in areas affected by fires “said Professor Caleb Scoville to AFP on January 14.
It is therefore wrong to ensure that Governor Gavin Newsom has blocked the water supply from the north. The Los Angeles water supply is mainly ensured via aqueducts and channels from different river basins, located further east.
Mr. Newsom described these new narratives, used several times by Donald Trump, as “wacky fantasies“, in an interview given on January 14 (archived here).
In addition, the authorities also said that even if more water had been available, it would have been impossible to contain the initial fire households.
“I’m going to be clear: we could have had much more water, with these gusts of wind, we could not have stopped these lights“, estimated Chad Augustin, the chief of the Pasadena firefighters on January 8 (archived here).
Emergency vehicle deployments
On the social network X, users also said that dozens of firefighters who have been arrested and selected to control their carbon emissions.
The State of California has actually launched a control program for compliance with heavy vehicle emissions to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. However, emergency vehicles, such as fire trucks, are not subject to these checks, as indicated on its site the atmospheric resources council in California (archived here).
Oregon firefighters’ spokesman John Hendricks confirmed to AFP on January 16 that the statements that Oregon fire teams had been stopped were false.
“We mobilized 21 teams and 370 firefighters. We sent 75 trucks, and 30 tanks“said Hendricks.”There were no blockages or stops for checks“, He assured AFP.
The Oregon fire department had already denied these false information on X, January 12, and insured “that no truck had been arrested“(Archived here).
Emergency vehicles, on the other hand, has been the subject of a routine safety inspection by California firefighters, who carried out the necessary repairs before their deployment (archived here).
“The fire season is all year round”
According to meteorologists, a dry winter combined with the strong winds of Santa Ana has created the optimal conditions for the spread of fires (archived here).
“It is highly unusual to have fires like these, attributed to the very dry winter experienced by California after a particularly dry summer, and to the winds of Santa Ani“Explains Toddi Steelman, fire expert at the University of Duke (archived here).
“The fire season is now all year round“, She assured January 8 (archived here).
Climate specialist Katharine Hayoe also said that the situation had been aggravated by “exceptional drought and winding conditions, leading to fires powered by climate change, which burn faster and more broadly than before“(Archived here).
Many public infrastructure and services in Los Angeles “Were not prepared in the face of the magnitude of the disaster“Said the scientist to AFP on January 9.
For Jay Lund, engineering professor at the University of California-Davis (archived here), recent events “clearly exceeded the capabilities of fire fighting and their small scale, perfected in urban areas, giving a false impression of security“.
While the climate is evolving, and the variations between extremely dry and extremely humid conditions are multiplying, new methods of construction and urban development must be thought in the zones vulnerable to fires, estimated Mr. Lund on January 14.
Since the start of the Los Angeles fires, AFP has examined many false information circulating online, like here, here, or here.
