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Read the article. It mentions in multiple places that climate change is increasing the duration of the forest fire season and worsening conditions that promote
by CarelessExpert 5y ago
Read the article.
It mentions in multiple places that climate change is increasing the duration of the forest fire season and worsening conditions that promote wildfire.
The point of the article is that outcomes of poor forestry management practices (a build up of fuel that lead to truly enormous wildfires when they finally burn) were bad enough, and now climate change is dramatically exacerbating those effects.
As a result, changing our forestry management practices to adopt controlled burns, thinning, and other techniques, will be a critical element of climate change adaptation.
That's not to say we shouldn't stop CO2 emissions as quickly as possible to avoid even worse future effects. But we've already warmed the globe enough that adaptation is already necessary, and this is just one example.
- Eric_WVGG 5y agoThe thing that's boggling my mind is, we've been hearing about this since the Yellowstone fire in 1988 — the forest immediately bounced back greener and healthier than before. That was over thirty years ago! It’s incredible that controlled burns are even controversial today.
- CarelessExpert 5y agoYeah, I find it deeply frustrating. We've known about the dangers of wildfire suppression for literally decades, and yet it's taken a very long time for forestry management practices to change. There's likely many reasons for that, from institutional momentum to a lack of funding, but something has to change or forests will simply burn uncontrolled and the problem will solve itself...