Climate change is increasing the number of dry days we see in the desert southwest and many believe it is the driving force behind our longer wildfire seasons.
“When we are looking at changes to climate in Arizona, our temperatures have increased over the last 130 years,” said Erinanne Saffell, an Arizona State Climatologist.
That makes our atmosphere thirstier and dries out our plants.
2023 wildfire season outlook: experts say to stay vigilant, protect your property
“We call that desiccation, so then those plants become more susceptible when we do have...a wildfire event happening, and it can spread a little bit more,” said Saffell.
It’s not just temperatures playing a role — Arizona’s 29-year-long drought isn’t helping either.
“Unless we get a few more wet years, we are going to still be in that long-term drought and all of that matters when we are looking at wildfire season,” said Saffell.
A published study by Climate Central looked at the number of fire weather days over the last 50 years. Those are the days of hot, dry windy weather that set the stage for extreme fire behavior.
“We’ve really seen widespread increases in the number of fire weather days across the entire west,” said Kaitlyn Trudeau, a Senior Research Associate at Climate Central.
As those days increase, it could become harder and more dangerous when wildfires break out.
“What climate change is really doing is kind of acting like a threat multiplier,” said Trudeau.
As moisture gets pulled out from the vegetation and soils due to our hotter and drier climate, it creates a hot drought.
“It’s a drought that is not caused by a lack of precipitation, it’s caused by increasing temperatures, which then increases evaporation,” said Trudeau.
Combined with our normal drought, that increases our threat of more catastrophic wildfires.
And it’s not just day temperatures heating up but our overnight temperatures too, which is making the fight against wildfires a 24-hour job.
“There is really no substitute for just reducing the number of greenhouse gases we are emitting into the atmosphere, that’s what really is driving this long-term temperature change,” said Trudeau.
“We have an impact on the environment around us and what happens to the environment around us also impacts us,” said Trudeau.
