forest fires in europe 2020

Hotter summers increase the risk of forest fires, which hit record levels in Sweden in 2018. Do something for our planet, print this page only if needed. Past trends of fire danger have also been analysed by processing series of meteorological fire danger indices, which are routinely used to rate the fire potential owing to climate conditions. These threats do not respect national borders and are exacerbated by climate change. Learn about deforestation rates and other land use practices, forest fires, forest communities, biodiversity and much more. This figure actually represents a 31% decrease compared to the average number of wildfires in the last decade (18,923), and a 15% decrease compared to 2015. The median of the five model ensemble is shown for each period. This Horizon2020 project developed Financial and Institutional Reforms to build an Entrepreneurial Society (FIRES) in Europe. Here are the forest fires and wildfires around the world during 2020 compiled by Anadolu Agency: JANUARY Jan. 1: Australian bushfires continue in the new year with 20 dead thus far, including three volunteer firefighters. The model does not account for the Netherlands’ extensive flood-prevention measures, although many other countries have not taken such action. ... 2020 Ukrainian serviceman works at the site of a forest fire, in Luhansk region on October 1, 2020 Reuters. This database is an important component of EFFIS. ... 2020 at 12:00 p.m. UTC. More European countries suffered from large forest fires in 2018 than ever before, and Sweden experienced the worst fire season in reporting history. Forest fire data are provided each year by individual EU Member States in accordance with several EU regulations, and additional data coming from other European countries are checked, stored and managed by JRC within EFFIS. While the climate data has been published before, this is the first time the EU-agency has presented it using detailed maps on one site. And while they used to be a serious problem only in hotter, southern European countries such as Portugal and Spain, now northern Europe is in trouble too. The European Wilderness Society is currently putting together an exciting proposal for the Horizon 2020 call “Forest Fires risk reduction: towards an integrated fire management approach in the E.U.” (LC-CLA-15-2020). However, climatic factors and the availability of fuel determine the conditions under which fires occur and spread, once ignition has occurred. Forest fires are up by 13% in 2020, more intense and can cross 2019’s record-breaking numbers: Study. Both fire seasons coincided with record droughts and heat waves in the spring and summer of these years in the most affected regions. Europe’s nature under threat as world suffers worst year on record for forest fires. Without urgent action, rising sea levels by end of century could leave cities under water, Last modified on Thu 14 May 2020 11.35 EDT. In general, as frequency increases, fuels have less time to accumulate, reducing intensity and subsequent tree mortality. This will be achieved by bridging knowledge gaps and further developing the European climate adaptation platform (Climate-ADAPT) as the ‘first-stop shop’ for climate adaptation information in Europe. “Sea level rise, especially, can be problematic, because it is still increasing because of past emissions and the current concentration of greenhouse gases.”, The agency wants governments to focus on adapting to unavoidable global heating. One of the objectives of the EU adaptation strategy is to allow ‘Better informed decision-making’. For references, please go to https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/indicators/forest-fire-danger-3/assessment or scan the QR code. Meanwhile, large areas of Spain, Portugal and France would be grappling with desertification, with the worst-affected zones experiencing a two and half-fold increase in droughts under the worst-case scenario. An average one-metre rise in sea levels by the end of the century – without any flood prevention action – would mean 90% of the surface of Hull would be under water, according to the European Environment Agency. ... wiped out forests in Central Europe, especially in Germany and Czech Republic. the current state of and projected changes in forest fire danger. A recent global attribution analysis found that anthropogenic increases in extreme FWI days have emerged for 22 % of burnable land area globally by 2019, including most of the Mediterranean region [viii]. The entire time series has been estimated and the 90 % quantile of each time period has been computed. The EEA has concluded it is possible to limit the rise in global temperatures to 2C above pre-industrial levels, as long as greenhouse gas concentrations peak during the next 15 to 29 years. The Mechanism was upgraded in March 2019 to establish a new European reserve of capacities (the ‘rescEU reserve’) which includes firefighting planes and … 6 (11 June 2014): 1477–90, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-14-1477-2014; Itziar R Urbieta et al., ‘Fire Activity as a Function of Fire–Weather Seasonal Severity and Antecedent Climate across Spatial Scales in Southern Europe and Pacific Western USA’,Environmental Research Letters 10, no. • Develop an adequate information system to follow-up on all of the above. This has been corrected. In November 2013, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union adopted the EU's Seventh Environment Action Programme (7th EAP) to 2020, ‘Living well, within the limits of our planet’. [xi] Minchao Wu et al., ‘Sensitivity of Burned Area in Europe to Climate Change, Atmospheric CO 2 Levels, and Demography: A Comparison of Two Fire-Vegetation Models’,Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences 120, no. A forest revival in Europe is forcing that discussion now. The Copenhagen-based agency hopes the maps will reach decision-makers in governments and EU institutions, who would not usually read a lengthy EEA report on the impact of the climate emergency. The daily FWI is computed for each scenario realisation based on a corresponding model. to diversify markets, but poses a significant challenge for sustainable management and Thus, climate change is expected to have a strong impact on forest fire regimes in Europe. Demand for new uses in the bioeconomy and in bioenergy Van Wagner et al., 1987: Development and Structure of the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System. The burnt area in the Mediterranean region has shown a slightly decreasing trend since 1980, but with high interannual variability; the meteorological fire hazard has increased over the same period as a result of global climate change. The new forest strategy is a key reference in forest-related policy development. Information on forest fires is collected in the JRC's European Fire Database. The Joint Research Centre of the Commission presented the 20 th edition of its Annual Report on Forest Fires in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, covering 2019. chemicals or textile fibres) and for renewable energy. The EEA is an agency of the European Union. The Canadian FWI is used by EFFIS to rate the daily fire danger conditions in Europe. Further objectives include ‘Promoting adaptation in key vulnerable sectors through climate-proofing EU sector policies’ and ‘Promoting action by Member States’. Frequent and large-scale fires have negative impacts on air and water quality, threaten biodiversity, increase the risks of soil erosion and spoil the aesthetics of a landscape. Mean seasonal FWI can successfully explain most of the year-to-year variation in burnt area in European countries [v]. Lives were lost, livelihoods destroyed and many hectares of land burned. A recent study using drought conditions as a predictor of forest fire risk projects increases in burnt area in Mediterranean Europe (EUMED5) that range from ~40 % under 1.5 °C global warming to ~100 % under 3 °C warming [xii]. These changes are more pronounced for higher than for lower emission scenarios. • Ensure that the multifunctional potential of EU forests is managed in a sustainable and The Pantanal saw 16 times more primary forest loss in 2020 than the year before. People living in the Brazilian Amazon are facing the twin dangers of the coronavirus and forest fires. [v] A. Venäläinen et al., ‘Temporal Variations and Change in Forest Fire Danger in Europe for 1960–2012’,Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences 14, no. resource and energy efficiency, raw materials, logistics, structural adaptation, Time series on forest fires for the five European countries most affected by forest fires go back to 1980; data from other countries have been increasingly available since 1990. ... forest fires around the defunct Chernobyl nuclear plant in the north of the country and elsewhere pushed pollution levels in Ukraine's capital Kyiv to the worst in the world. What is one of the largest wildlife areas in Europe will take years to recover. Satellite images of wildfires in the Chernobyl exclusion zone, taken 18 April 2020 © Greenpeace Global Mapping Hub Source: NASA Worldview, OpenStreetMap “The number of extreme events and sea level rise will still continue to increase for the next decades to a century,” Kurnik said. 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