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David Welling was up very early, photographing Point Imperial in Grand Canyon National Park, when a thunderstorm came rolling through. “This is what everyone that slept in missed that morning,” David writes.
2011 National Wildlife Photo Contest entry.

Your Photo Could Be Here

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Whitewater-Baldy Fire, New Mexico on June 6, 2012. Credit: Kari Greer, USFS Gila National Forest.

There’s compelling evidence that talking about western wildfires without mentioning climate change is like talking about lung cancer without mentioning cigarettes. I want to walk you through what’s happening out west right now, what the latest science tells us about why it’s happening, how it’s affecting people and wildlife in the region, and what we can do about it.

The Latest Major Fires

The consequences of carbon pollution are immediately apparent to residents of Colorado this week. More than 52,000 acres of forest have burned since lightning started the High Park Fire on June 9. Smoke has been wafting over Fort Collins, as stands of pines have been going up in dramatic blazes. The fire is already the second largest in the state’s history, exceeded only by the 2002 Hayman Fire. Of course, the High Park Fire is only 15% contained, so it may well take the leader spot in the days to come.

In the meantime, New Mexico is in the midst of fighting the largest wildfire in its history. The Whitewater-Baldy Complex Fire has already burned nearly 300,000 acres, mostly in the Gila National Forest. This fire comes on the heels of the Las Conchas Fire last summer, which ranked as the largest New Mexico wildfire at the time. What’s worse, heavy rainstorms after the fire was extinguished led to major flooding and erosion. Sediment and ash were washed downstream into the Rio Grande, affecting drinking water for Albuquerque, the largest city in New Mexico.

Climate change is literally fueling these and other major fires in western states. In fact, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas have all had fires since last year that ranked as one of the two largest in their histories (see table). The frequency and extent of fires in recent decades is unlikely to happen under natural conditions. With one catastrophic fire after another, it is clear that something quite different is happening to our forests.

Climate Trends and Forest Fires

Climate scientists have identified several ways that a warming planet will increase forest fire risk. Not surprisingly, all of these factors are fanning the fires we’ve been seeing recently in the western United States.

• Longer fire seasons: Western forests typically become combustible within a month of the snowpack melting, which is happening 1 to 4 weeks earlier than it did 50 years ago. This year, an unusually warm and dry winter resulted in one of the smallest snowpacks in Colorado history. As of June 1, the snowpack was only 2% of its normal extent.
• Drier conditions: Climate change is expected to bring more frequent and more intense droughts to the Southwest, perhaps shifting the area to a more arid climate. As of the end of May, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Texas all had areas in the grip of severe and extreme drought.
• More fuel for forest fires: Widespread beetle infestations have left broad swaths of dead and highly combustible trees in their wake. Higher temperatures enhance winter survival of mountain pine beetles and allow for a more rapid lifecycle. Ecologists in Colorado recently confirmed that beetle populations are able to complete two generations during longer, warmer summers, leading to a possible 60-fold increase in the number of beetles.
• Increased frequency of lightning is expected as thunderstorms become more severe. In the western United States lightning strikes could increase by 12 to 30 percent by mid-century. Both the High Park fire in Colorado and the Whitewater-Baldy Complex Fire in New Mexico were ignited by lightning.

Communities, Firefighters, Taxpayers & Wildlife Bearing the Costs

Communities can be rocked by wildfires. During the last decade, property losses in the US have averaged $1 billion annually. Take the town of Bastrop, Texas, home to just over 7,000 people who braved the most catastrophic wildfire that state had ever seen last fall. More than 1,600 homes were destroyed and two people lost their lives. Insured property losses for the fire totaled $325 million, and clean up cost another $25 million. That’s on top of the millions spent to put out the fire in the first place.  Dealing with these sorts of disasters also takes an emotional toll on people, as discussed in a recent NWF report on the psychological impacts of climate change.

Firefighters are having to adapt to the new wildfire realities. They are struggling to keep up with these longer fire seasons, which in some places are now effectively year round, leaving little time to regroup and prepare for the next incident. Moreover, they are finding it harder to control fires, in part because fires are less likely to quiet down at night like they used to. Nighttime conditions are hotter and drier, meaning that fires can stay active around the clock.

Taxpayers are footing the bill for fighting these fires. The cost of wildfire suppression—about $3 billion a year—has tripled in the United States since the late 1990’s. The majority of these expenses are borne by the U.S. Forest Service, which now spends around half of its annual budget on fighting fires.

Wildlife is not immune to the impacts of increasing fire frequency and intensity. Many ecosystems have evolved so that episodic fires are part of their natural rhythms, but are struggling to cope with the new fire patterns. These mega-fires are trapping animals that would otherwise be able to flee, causing widespread habitat destruction, and even causing wholesale landscape conversion. 

Cutting Carbon Pollution Can Reduce Future Fire Risks

To prevent wildfires from getting much worse and to limit the risks communities and wildlife, we must reduce carbon pollution. Just this week a new climate study came out making projections that many areas of the world, including the western United States, should expect even more fires if we continue spewing carbon pollution into the atmosphere.

Take Action

Fortunately, we know what steps to take to and have the tools to start taking action now. The Environmental Protection Agency is creating the first limits on carbon pollution emitted from power plants. Please take a moment right now to tell the EPA you support limits on industrial carbon pollution.

Fire truck at Arizona's Wallow Fire, June 2011 (US Forest Service, Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests)

One of the least-controversial impacts of the climate crisis is more frequent, severe and damaging wildfires in America’s West. Why won’t reporters say so?

As my National Wildlife Federation colleague Aislinn Maestas detailed last week, it’s been a scary spring for wildfires in Arizona, Texas, and her home state of New Mexico. Global warming caused by man-made carbon pollution is fueling perfect conditions, with longer fire seasons, drier conditions and more lightning strikes.

But a search of Google News over the last week shows very few reporters are connecting the dots for their readers. I did a search for stories that mentioned both wildfires and climate or global warming. I found very few stories in mainstream news outlets that mentioned climate and wildfires together at all, and the ones that did were just as likely to wrongly downplay the connection as correctly draw the scientifically-documented tie. (Note that Google News is a crude tool, not covering every print outlet and including very little of what’s said on TV and radio. If you know a story I missed, please add it in comments.)

First, the reporters that made the right scientific connection between wildfires and global warming:

• ABC News directly connects global warming and extreme weather
• Public Radio International doesn’t just connect carbon pollution and changes in weather patterns – it asks if enough is being done to prepare communities for future disasters
• NPR’s Science Friday had as a guest Joel Achenbach, who recently predicted that the 2100s will be the Century of Disasters
• Reuters asks if the insurance industry can survive the new era

That’s it. Four stories that accurately connected wildfires and global warming based on the best science available. That’s all I could find.

Now for the stories that mentioned climate and wildfires but failed to correctly connect the dots:

• PBS downplays the link by quoting AccuWeather, which until recently employed climate science denier Joe  Bastardi
• USA Today baldly states its disinterest in delving into any link, saying, ”Never mind the debate over global warming, its possible causes and effects.”
• A New York Times/Greenwire article ignores the evidence supporting a link, instead going into extensive detail on what we don’t know (Joe Romm analyzes this article in more depth at Climate Progress)
• The Arizona Republic makes only a passing reference to the climate link while making the wildfires sound strictly like a forest management issue

CNN.com didn’t connect climate and wildfires in America that I could see. However, it does have story noting that thanks to global warming Siberia, once frozen, is now on fire.

What’s so strange about reporters’ reticence is that the connection between global warming and wildfires isn’t controversial in the climate science community. While scientists are always eager to learn more and shine light in every possible corner, the basics are straightforward and established: More heat + more droughts = more wildfires. Don’t believe me? Ask NASA. Or the Environmental Protection Agency.

How established? Dr. Amanda Staudt, the National Wildlife Federation’s climate scientist, made this video on the climate-wildfire connection a full three years ago:

Click here to view the embedded video.

So why doesn’t the line get drawn? Polluter-funded front groups and their allies in the media stand ready to attack anyone who reports scientific fact on climate change. For both reporters and the government officials they’re quoting, it takes courage to stand up to that.

Most ironic about the New York Times/Greenwire article: Just last week, the Times’ Leslie Kaufman wrote this about a recent climate poll:

Scientists at the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration [NOAA] drew a relatively high approval rating, with 76 percent of respondents saying they strongly or somewhat trusted them.

Of course, the agency states unequivocally that the earth is warming and that human activity is a leading cause. So if 76 percent of the American public trusts NOAA scientists strongly or somewhat, why don’t more people accept their conclusions?

NOAA wrote about Climate Enhanced Wildfires … in 1998. But here we are 13 years later and the New York Times is still reporting to the controversy on the climate-wildfires link. Is it any wonder some Americans are still uncertain?

To learn more about the connection between global warming and extreme weather, visit NWF.org/ExtremeWeather.

Wallow fire picture courtesy of US Forest Service, Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest

When most people think of spring, they picture refreshing April showers, beautiful blooming gardens, outdoor barbeques and pleasant temperatures.

For people in the southwest, however, spring often means gusting winds, dry heat and severe drought. Put them together, add a spark, and what do you get? Ding-ding-ding: Wildfires.

[Let me pause here and point out that not all fires are bad. In fact, wildfire plays a key role in maintaining the health of many ecosystems.]

Growing up in Silver City, NM, a small town bordering the Gila National Forest, I learned that the threat of wildfires can impact life in small but unforgettable ways. A high fire threat level can mean camping without the campfire, having a barbeque without the grill, and celebrating the 4^th of July without any fireworks.

Small sacrifices I know, but next to praying for rain, it’s all that most people can do to help.

This year, in a region marked by exceptional drought (see graph below), preventing and controlling wildfires has been a losing battle. And for people living in the region, small sacrifices have given way to big losses:

• Arizonans are currently fighting a raging wildfire that has scorched more than 480 square miles of the state and sent smoke all the way to Iowa. Residents have been evacuated, flights have been diverted on account of heavy smoke, and air quality alerts have been issued.
• In Texas, more than 400 homes have burned across the state amid severe drought and high winds since November.
• Twenty-seven wildfires were reported in a single four day period last month in New Mexico.
• The National Climatic Data Center reports that wildfire activity “scorched more than twice the area of any April this century.”

These numbers are scary on their own, but they are even more alarming if taken as a harbinger of things to come. While many are attributing this year’s fire season to La Niña, scientists warn that the trend of larger and more severe fires will only get worse as a result of climate change.

While it is not possible to attribute a single weather event to climate change, recent events have many drawing a link between climate change and the surge in droughts, floods, heat waves and other extreme weather events.

Newsweek: The Reality of Global Climate Change is Upon Us

Even those who deny the existence of global climate change are having trouble dismissing the evidence of the last year. In the U.S. alone, nearly 1,000 tornadoes have ripped across the heartland, killing more than 500 people and inflicting $9 billion in damage. The Midwest suffered the wettest April in 116 years, forcing the Mississippi to flood thousands of square miles, even as drought-plagued Texas suffered the driest month in a century.

Reuters: Is Extreme Weather the New Normal?

An upsurge in heavy rainstorms in the United States has coincided with prolonged drought, sometimes in the same location, she said, noting that west Texas has seen a record-length dry period over the last five years, even as there have been two 100-year rain events…Hayhoe, other scientists, civic planners and a manager at the giant Swiss Re reinsurance firm all cited human-caused climate change as an factor pushing this shift toward more extreme weather.

Knowing that the rains will eventually come, the winds will die down and the fires will stop burning does not bring me the comfort it once did. I guess this is because I am no longer a child concerned only with fireworks and barbeques, but an adult worried about the future of our planet.

Now, when friends or family tell me to pray for rain, I still do. But I also send a note to my elected officials demanding action on climate change. Let’s hope that both these messages are heard and answered soon.

See the two-minute video Fascinating.

CNet News: GreenTech reports:

“The U.S. Bureau of Land Management, in conjunction with the Department of Energy, this week released six maps that could help determine the location of the next big push in solar energy.The BLM maps cover areas within the six U.S. states most suitable for solar energy generation and transmission as judged by the U.S. government: Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.

“Only lands with excellent solar resources, suitable slope, proximity to roads and transmission lines or designated corridors, and containing at least 2,000 acres of BLM-administered public lands were considered for solar energy study areas. Sensitive lands, wilderness and other high-conservation-value lands as well as lands with conflicting uses were excluded,” according to a BLM statement released with the maps.”

See full article.

James Towner, the green blogger who started  AZSustainability, tells us a little bit about why he joined the “good neighborhood” and tells us why he does the incredible stuff he’s doing.

What inspired you to start your blog and “go green”?

Growing up in the mountains of Colorado I was exposed to the beauty and wonders of nature a lot as a kid so I was brought up with an appreciation for our natural environment.  What kick started my interest into action as an adult was initially an interest in biofuels.  After buying a VW TDI and making a couple small batches of home brewed biodiesel I became a part of the TDI Community and we started talking about these kinds of things.  We built an online community specifically to talk about our cars and fuel as well as meeting in person periodically. Eventually I wanted an outlet for my other environmental interests that would inform other local folks, along came AzSustainability.

Have you ever helped a friend make environmentally friendly choices?

I try to encourage friends to make environmentally friendly choices like maybe suggesting a more fuel efficient car if they are car shopping or even buying something reusable instead of disposable. I also hope that I’m helping others make better choices with my blog.

Part of being a good neighbor, is being good to everything around you. Please name a time you’ve felt truly connected to your community.

I feel better connected when I meet people at our community supported
agriculture, and at events like the Green Summit, and especially when I can get together with small groups such as our local TDI car club.

What do you think a good neighbor entails?

Listening to what others in the neighborhood are saying even if you don’t agree, going out and doing good things instead of just thinking about it, recognizing a need and filling it.

So keep a look out for James Towner — he’s a rock star of the green world. If you talk to him on October 23rd, make sure to wish him a happy birthday! Thank you James for all you have done.