9 February 2016, Climate Home, Climate-linked bushfire warning as Tasmania’s ancient forests blaze. Trees 1,000 years old have been caught in the weeks-long blaze, sparked by lightning strikes in unusually dry conditions. More than 100,000 hectares have been blackened. The inferno comes as evidence mounts that human-caused climate change is raising the risk of bushfires, warned think tank the Climate Institute. “It points to the need for a two-pronged strategy,” said CEO John Connor: “To be working hard to cut carbon pollution while, at the same time, building greater resilience to bushfires caused by the global warming already locked in.” The Climate Institute drew on research by lead science agency CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology. They had found an increase in the frequency and severity of fires in more than 42% of southern Australia since 1973. With high levels of future warming, models show the number of “very high” fire days in Tasmania could more than double. It threatens world heritage forests that have not evolved to cope with cycles of fire and regrowth, unlike Australia’s hardier eucalyptus. Tasmania’s parks service, in a review of the response to severe bushfires in 2013, said dry lightning had taken over from arson as the major cause. But that should not be seen as a natural phenomenon to be left unmanaged, it argued, “if human-induced climate change is a contributing factor”. Conservationists are calling for a public inquiry into the authorities’ handling of fire risk. Michael Grose from CSIRO told the Guardian Australia human activity was making dry, fire-friendly conditions more likely. “Hotter temperatures, reduced rainfall in key seasons [and] worse fire weather, are all consistent with what is projected with climate change, particularly under a high-emission scenario,” he said. Read More here
Tag Archives: Bushfire
4 February 2016 Global Footprint newsletter article , If an acre of forest burns up in flames, what’s the cost? Zero, was FEMA’s reply in 2013. The Federal Emergency Management Agency rejected California’s request for a federal “major disaster” declaration and funding after the devastating Rim Fire, because it only knew how to put a price tag on man-made structures. The 400 square miles of forests that had been reduced to ashes and charred stumps—including part of Yosemite National Park—couldn’t translate into dollar amounts.How times have changed. Two weeks ago, the state of California was named one of the 13 winners of the National Disaster Resilience Competition by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Rockefeller Foundation. California won more than $70 million to help fund several disaster preparedness projects in communities affected by the Rim Fire. What happened? As extreme weather events have become more frequent due to climate change, decision-makers are realizing that conventional project assessments won’t do, and that building strong, resilient communities requires drastically innovative approaches. In a first for a federal agency, the HUD Office of Economic Resilience, in collaboration with the Rockefeller Foundation, mandated that nature be a key element in the design of development projects submitted to the $1 billion competition. HUD required all applicants to use a more complete benefit-cost analysis developed by Earth Economics, a close partner of Global Footprint Network. It is exactly the kind of approach that Global Footprint Network and Earth Economics called for in July in our State of the States Report, which found the United States demands twice the resources that its ecosystems can regenerate. It is also similar to the approach that Global Footprint Network piloted with the state of Maryland when developing our Net Present Value Plus tool. Read more here
16 December 2015, CSIRO ECOS CSIRO and Ngadju tackle bushfires in the Great Western Woodlands. Old and new ways of fire management are coming together to help protect one of the most unique woodlands on the planet. Members of the Ngadju community began working with CSIRO about four years ago to help prevent fires in the Great Western Woodlands (GWW) in south-western Australia. The GWW is the largest remaining tract of dry climate woodland on Earth. The region receives as little as 250 mm rain per year. Owing to the variable rainfall and lack of readily accessible groundwater suitable for livestock, much of the region has remained virtually unchanged since European settlement. However during recent years, the GWW has experienced an increase in the frequency of large, intense wildfires causing fire-sensitive old-growth woodlands to be lost at an alarming rate. Leslie Schultz from Ngadju Conservation believes climate change is contributing to the increase in fires. “The heat we get now is harsher and when it does come, there’s less rain—this can only spell trouble for the Woodlands,” he said. Les said the relationship between Ngadju and CSIRO was born from his own experience of “burning off country”—something he learnt from his elders. “We need to control the country so it doesn’t control us,” Les said. “We want to incorporate our traditional land management methods. We managed our country not with rakes, shovels and bulldozers but with fire.” The insight and the benefits of utilising Indigenous fire knowledge was no more apparent than during the recent devastating bushfires in Western Australia. These fires damaged large areas of the GWW directly. In the nearby community of Esperance one fire led to the loss of four lives, with reportedly more than 280,000 hectares of farmland burnt, along with houses, sheds, machinery and almost 5,000 livestock. Ngadju mobilised to help fight these fires and provided valuable insight into the current landscape. They also currently operate a small ranger team in the GWW and undertake a mix of contract land management. Read More here
24 November 2015, The Conversation, Feeding ‘Godzilla’: as Indonesia burns, its government moves to increase forest destruction. In the midst of its worst fire crisis in living memory, the Indonesian government is taking a leap backward on forest protection. The recently signed Council of Palm Oil Producing Nations between Indonesia and Malaysia, signed at the weekend in Kuala Lumpur, will attempt to wind back palm oil companies’ pledges to end deforestation. This is despite Indonesia’s efforts to end fires and palm oil cultivation on peatlands. If successful the move will undo recent attempts to end deforestation from palm oil production, and exacerbate the risk of future forest fires. Forests on fire Since August, forest and peatland fires have become so widespread across Indonesia that, in satellite images, the nation has looked like an over-lit Christmas tree. The fires have been so bad that carbon emissions from peatland burning alone (forgetting about the many thousands of additional forest fires) have equalled those produced by the entire United States Schools and airports have been repeatedly closed across large expanses of Southeast Asia. To reduce their risks, residents have been told to stay indoors. Some 500,000 people have so far suffered respiratory distress. Nearby Singapore has threatened legal action against several Indonesian companies whose activities have been linked to the fires, provoking a serious diplomatic spat between the two nations. Read More here