Ruinous Damage In California Consistent With Climate Change Models

Researchers at the Oregon State University find out the ruinous damage cause due to massive fire in Southern California are consistent with climate change models.

Climate change, and our response to it, are issues of global importance, affecting environment and ecosystem. Climate model are numerical representation of various Earth's climate model.

Prof. Ronald Neilson, a scientist in the Oregon State University,find out that the ruinous damage caused by fire in Southern California consistent with climate change model.

Findings revealed that when combined, the model accurately predicted both the Southern California fires that were happening, and the drought that had recently hit parts of the Southeast, including Georgia and Florida.

Neilson, a professor at Oregon State University and bioclimatologist with the USDA Forest Service said, the latest models suggested that parts of the US might be experiencing longer-term precipitation patterns – less year-to-year variability, but rather several wet years in a row followed by several that are drier than normal.

“This is exactly what we’ve been projecting to happen, both in short-term fire forecasts for this year and the longer term patterns that can be linked to global climate change,” said Prof. Neilson.

“You can’t look at one event such as this and say with certainty that it was caused by a changing climate. But things just like this are consistent with what the latest modelling shows, and may be another piece of evidence that climate change is a reality, one with serious effects,” he said.

Prof. Neilson said, as the Earth warmed, more water was being evaporated from the oceans.

All that water came somewhere as precipitation, which at times led to heavier vegetation loads popping up, thereby creating a tremendous fuel load, he said.

“But the warmth and other climatic forces are also going to create periodic droughts. If you get an ignition source during these periods, the fires can just become explosive,” he said.

He added that events such as El Niño or La Nina could compound these problems.

He said a La Niña episode currently under way was probably amplifying the Southern California drought.

“But when rains return for a period of years, the burned vegetation may inevitably re-grow to very dense levels,” he said.

“In the future, catastrophic fires such as those going on now in California may simply be a normal part of the landscape,” he added.

Source-ANI
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