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Climate News - Wildfires in Europe could burn across about 39 percent
more land by the end of the century, even if greenhouse gas emissions decline
rapidly over the next few decades, new research shows. With continued high
emissions, the burned area could increase as much as 192 percent.
Emissions reductions are the key
to reducing wildfire impacts, the study, published Thursday in Global Change
Biology, concluded. Improvements in fire prevention, early detection and
firefighting could help limit the damage, but ultimately, Europe can’t fight
its way out of a worsening climate, the authors warned.
“Our results indicate there could
be widespread increases in burned area even under comparatively low warming of
around 1.8 degrees Celsius (3.24 degrees Fahrenheit),” said lead author Maik
Billing, a researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
With more warming, wildfires become more prevalent around the Mediterranean and
across much of Western and Central Europe, “including areas that to date have
not experienced many fires,” he said.