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2023•bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)Open access

Assessing changes in global fire regimes

Sayedeh Sara Sayedi, Benjamin W. Abbott, Boris Vannière, Bérangère A. Leys, Danièle Colombaroli, Graciela Gil‐Romera, Michał Słowiński, Julie C. Aleman, Olivier Blarquez, Angelica Feurdean, Kendrick J. Brown, Tuomas Aakala, Teija Alenius, Kathryn Allen, Maja Andrič, Yves Bergeron, Siria Biagioni, Richard Bradshaw, Laurent Brémond, Élodie Brisset, Joseph Brooks, Sandra Bruegger, Thomas Brussel, Haidee Cadd, Eleonora Cagliero, Christopher Carcaillet, Vachel A. Carter, Filipe X. Catry, Antoine Champreux, Émeline Chaste, Raphaël D. Chavardès, Melissa Lynn Chipman, Marco Conedera, Simon Connor, Mark Constantine, Colin J. Courtney Mustaphi, Abraham Dabengwa, W. Daniels, Erik J. de Boer, Elisabeth Dietze, Joan Estrany, Paulo M. Fernandes, Walter Finsinger, Suzette G. A. Flantua, Paul Fox‐Hughes, Dorian M. Gaboriau, Eugenia M. Gayó, Martin P. Girardin, Jeffery Glenn, Ramesh Glückler, Catalina González, Mariangelica Groves, Rebecca Jenner Hamilton, Douglas Stephen Hamilton, Stijn Hantson, Kartika Anggi Hapsari, Mark Hardiman, Donna Hawthorne, Kira M. Hoffman, Virginia Iglesias, Jun Inoue, Allison Tyler Karp, Patrik Krebs, Charuta Kulkarni, Niina Kuosmanen, Terri Lacourse, Marie‐Pierre Ledru, Marion Lestienne, Colin J. Long, José Antonio López Sáez, Nicholas J. D. Loughlin, Elizabeth A. Lynch, Mats Niklasson, Javier Madrigal, Shira Yoshi Maezumi, Katarzyna Marcisz, Grant A. Meyer, Michela Mariani, David B. McWethy, Chiara Molinari, Encarni Montoya, Scott Mooney, César Morales‐Molino, Jesse Lee Morris, Patrick Moss, Imma Oliveras Menor, José M. C. Pereira, Gianni Boris Pezzatti, Nadine Pickarski, Roberta Pini, Vincent Robin, Emma Rehn, Cécile C. Remy, Damien Rius, Yanming Ruan, Natalia A. Rudaya, Jeremy Russell‐Smith, Heikki Seppä, Lyudmila S. Shumilovskikh, William T. Sommers, Çağatay Tavşanoğlu, Charles Edward Umbanhowar, Erickson Urquiaga, Dunia H. Urrego, Richard S. Vachula, Tuomo Wallenius, Chao You, Anne‐Laure Daniau

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Abstract

Abstract Human activity has fundamentally altered wildfire on Earth, creating serious consequences for human health, global biodiversity, and climate change. However, it remains difficult to predict fire interactions with land use, management, and climate change, representing a serious knowledge gap and vulnerability. We used expert assessment to combine opinions about past and future fire regimes from 98 wildfire researchers. We asked for quantitative and qualitative assessments of the frequency, type, and implications of fire regime change from the beginning of the Holocene through the year 2300. Respondents indicated that direct human activity was already influencing wildfires locally since at least ~ 12,000 years BP, though natural climate variability remained the dominant driver of fire regime until around 5000 years BP. Responses showed a ten-fold increase in the rate of wildfire regime change during the last 250 years compared with the rest of the Holocene, corresponding first with the intensification and extensification of land use and later with anthropogenic climate change. Looking to the future, fire regimes were predicted to intensify, with increases in fire frequency, severity, and/or size in all biomes except grassland ecosystems. Fire regime showed quite different climate sensitivities across biomes, but the likelihood of fire regime change increased with higher greenhouse gas emission scenarios for all biomes. Biodiversity, carbon storage, and other ecosystem services were predicted to decrease for most biomes under higher emission scenarios. We present recommendations for adaptation and mitigation under emerging fire regimes, concluding that management options are seriously constrained under higher emission scenarios.

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What this paper is about

Abstract Human activity has fundamentally altered wildfire on Earth, creating serious consequences for human health, global biodiversity, and climate change. However, it remains difficult to predict fire interactions with land use, management, and climate change, representing a serious knowledge gap and vulnerability. We used expert assessment to combine opinions about past and future fire regimes from 98 wildfire researchers. We asked for quantitative and qualitative assessments of the frequency, type, and implications of fire regime change from the beginning of the Holocene through the year 2300. Respondents indicated that direct human activity was already influencing wildfires locally since at least ~ 12,000 years BP, though natural climate variability remained the dominant driver of fire regime until around 5000 years BP. Responses showed a ten-fold increase in the rate of wildfire regime change during the last 250 years compared with the rest of the Holocene, corresponding first with the intensification and extensification of land use and later with anthropogenic climate change. Looking to the future, fire regimes were predicted to intensify, with increases in fire frequency, severity, and/or size in all biomes except grassland ecosystems. Fire regime showed quite different climate sensitivities across biomes, but the likelihood of fire regime change increased with higher greenhouse gas emission scenarios for all biomes. Biodiversity, carbon storage, and other ecosystem services were predicted to decrease for most biomes under higher emission scenarios. We present recommendations for adaptation and mitigation under emerging fire regimes, concluding that management options are seriously constrained under higher emission scenarios.

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Available abstract

Abstract Human activity has fundamentally altered wildfire on Earth, creating serious consequences for human health, global biodiversity, and climate change. However, it remains difficult to predict fire interactions with land use, management, and climate change, representing a serious knowledge gap and vulnerability. We used expert assessment to combine opinions about past and future fire regimes from 98 wildfire researchers. We asked for quantitative and qualitative assessments of the frequency, type, and implications of fire regime change from the beginning of the Holocene through the year 2300. Respondents indicated that direct human activity was already influencing wildfires locally since at least ~ 12,000 years BP, though natural climate variability remained the dominant driver of fire regime until around 5000 years BP. Responses showed a ten-fold increase in the rate of wildfire regime change during the last 250 years compared with the rest of the Holocene, corresponding first with the intensification and extensification of land use and later with anthropogenic climate change. Looking to the future, fire regimes were predicted to intensify, with increases in fire frequency, severity, and/or size in all biomes except grassland ecosystems. Fire regime showed quite different climate sensitivities across biomes, but the likelihood of fire regime change increased with higher greenhouse gas emission scenarios for all biomes. Biodiversity, carbon storage, and other ecosystem services were predicted to decrease for most biomes under higher emission scenarios. We present recommendations for adaptation and mitigation under emerging fire regimes, concluding that management options are seriously constrained under higher emission scenarios.

Key concepts: Biome, Climate change, Fire regime, Biodiversity, Greenhouse gas, Environmental science, Ecosystem, Grassland

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