Synergy between land use and climate change increases future fire risk in Amazon forests

Journal Article · Wed Dec 20 00:00:00 EST 2017 · Earth System Dynamics (Online)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-8-1237-2017· OSTI ID:1415083

Le Page, Yannick ^[1]; Morton, Douglas ^[2]; Hartin, Corinne ^[3]; Bond-Lamberty, Ben ^[3]; Pereira, Jose Miguel Cardoso ^[1]; Hurtt, George ^[4]; Asrar, Ghassem ^[3]

---

1. University of Lisbon (Portugal). Centro de Estudos Florestais, Instituto Superior de Agronomia
2. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States)
3. Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States). Joint Global Change Research Institute
4. Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD (United States). Department of Geographical Sciences

Tropical forests have been a permanent feature of the Amazon basin for at least 55 million years, yet climate change and land use threaten the forest's future over the next century. Understory forest fires, which are common under the current climate in frontier forests, may accelerate Amazon forest losses from climate-driven dieback and deforestation. Far from land use frontiers, scarce fire ignitions and high moisture levels preclude significant burning, yet projected climate and land use changes may increase fire activity in these remote regions. Here, we used a fire model specifically parameterized for Amazon understory fires to examine the interactions between anthropogenic activities and climate under current and projected conditions. In a scenario of low mitigation efforts with substantial land use expansion and climate change – Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 8.5 – projected understory fires increase in frequency and duration, burning 4–28 times more forest in 2080–2100 than during 1990–2010. In contrast, active climate mitigation and land use contraction in RCP4.5 constrain the projected increase in fire activity to 0.9–5.4 times contemporary burned area. Importantly, if climate mitigation is not successful, land use contraction alone is very effective under low to moderate climate change, but does little to reduce fire activity under the most severe climate projections. These results underscore the potential for a fire-driven transformation of Amazon forests if recent regional policies for forest conservation are not paired with global efforts to mitigate climate change.

• Research Organization: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• Grant/Contract Number: AC05-76RL01830
• OSTI ID: 1415083
• Report Number(s): PNNL-SA--119758; 400409900
• Journal Information: Earth System Dynamics (Online), Journal Name: Earth System Dynamics (Online) Journal Issue: 4 Vol. 8; ISSN 2190-4987
• Publisher: European Geosciences Union
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES