Journal
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
Volume 9, Issue -, Pages -Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-05250-0
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- EU H2020 Project ECOPOTENTIAL: Improving Future Ecosystem Benefits through Earth Observations [641762]
- SERV-FORFIRE project of the ERA-NET for Climate Services, ERA4CS
- Spanish Juan de la Cierva Programme [IJCI-2015-26953]
- H2020 IMPREX project [641811]
- EUCP project [776613]
- National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) [NA14OAR4310222]
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) [NNX15AC27G]
- National Science Foundation (NSF) INFEWS grant [EAR 1639318]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Societal exposure to large fires has been increasing in recent years. Estimating the expected fire activity a few months in advance would allow reducing environmental and socio-economic impacts through short-term adaptation and response to climate variability and change. However, seasonal prediction of climate-driven fires is still in its infancy. Here, we discuss a strategy for seasonally forecasting burned area anomalies linking seasonal climate predictions with parsimonious empirical climate-fire models using the standardized precipitation index as the climate predictor for burned area. Assuming near-perfect climate predictions, we obtained skilful predictions of fire activity over a substantial portion of the global burnable area (similar to 60%). Using currently available operational seasonal climate predictions, the skill of fire seasonal forecasts remains high and significant in a large fraction of the burnable area (similar to 40%). These findings reveal an untapped and useful burned area predictive ability using seasonal climate forecasts, which can play a crucial role in fire management strategies and minimise the impact of adverse climate conditions.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available