IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/climat/v134y2016i1d10.1007_s10584-015-1521-0.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fuel moisture sensitivity to temperature and precipitation: climate change implications

Author

Listed:
  • M. D. Flannigan

    (University of Alberta)

  • B. M. Wotton

    (Great Lakes Forestry Centre
    University of Toronto)

  • G. A. Marshall

    (University of Alberta)

  • W. J. de Groot

    (Great Lakes Forestry Centre)

  • J. Johnston

    (Great Lakes Forestry Centre)

  • N. Jurko

    (Great Lakes Forestry Centre)

  • A. S. Cantin

    (Great Lakes Forestry Centre)

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to examine the sensitivity of fuel moisture to changes in temperature and precipitation and explore the implications under a future climate. We use the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System components to represent the moisture content of fine surface fuels (Fine Fuel Moisture Code, FFMC), upper forest floor (duff) layers (Duff Moisture Code, DMC) and deep organic soils (Drought Code, DC). We obtained weather data from 12 stations across Canada for the fire season during the 1971–2000 period and with these data we created a set of modified weather streams from the original data by varying the daily temperatures by 0 to +5 °C in increments of 1 °C and the daily precipitation from −40 to 40 % in increments of 10 %. The fuel moistures were calculated for all the temperature and precipitation combinations. When temperature increases we find that for every degree of warming, precipitation has to increase by more than 15 % for FFMC, about 10 % for DMC and about 5 % for DC to compensate for the drying caused by warmer temperatures. Also, we find in terms of the number of days equal to or above an FFMC of 91, a critical value for fire spread, that no increase in precipitation amount alone could compensate for a temperature increase of 1 °C. Results from three General Circulation Models (GCMs) and three emission scenarios suggest that this sensitivity to temperature increases will result in a future with drier fuels and a higher frequency of extreme fire weather days.

Suggested Citation

  • M. D. Flannigan & B. M. Wotton & G. A. Marshall & W. J. de Groot & J. Johnston & N. Jurko & A. S. Cantin, 2016. "Fuel moisture sensitivity to temperature and precipitation: climate change implications," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 134(1), pages 59-71, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:134:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1007_s10584-015-1521-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-015-1521-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-015-1521-0
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10584-015-1521-0?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Podur, Justin & Wotton, Michael, 2010. "Will climate change overwhelm fire management capacity?," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 221(9), pages 1301-1309.
    2. Xianli Wang & Dan Thompson & Ginny Marshall & Cordy Tymstra & Richard Carr & Mike Flannigan, 2015. "Increasing frequency of extreme fire weather in Canada with climate change," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 130(4), pages 573-586, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Aydin Azizi, 2018. "Computer-Based Analysis of the Stochastic Stability of Mechanical Structures Driven by White and Colored Noise," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(10), pages 1-19, September.
    2. Megan C. Kirchmeier-Young & Francis W. Zwiers & Nathan P. Gillett & Alex J. Cannon, 2017. "Attributing extreme fire risk in Western Canada to human emissions," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 144(2), pages 365-379, September.
    3. Anuj Tiwari & Mohammad Shoab & Abhilasha Dixit, 2021. "GIS-based forest fire susceptibility modeling in Pauri Garhwal, India: a comparative assessment of frequency ratio, analytic hierarchy process and fuzzy modeling techniques," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 105(2), pages 1189-1230, January.
    4. Nobel, Anne & Lizin, Sebastien & Witters, Nele & Rineau, Francois & Malina, Robert, 2020. "The impact of wildfires on the recreational value of heathland: A discrete factor approach with adjustment for on-site sampling," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    5. Khakzad, Nima, 2019. "Modeling wildfire spread in wildland-industrial interfaces using dynamic Bayesian network," Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Elsevier, vol. 189(C), pages 165-176.
    6. April M. Melvin & Jessica Murray & Brent Boehlert & Jeremy A. Martinich & Lisa Rennels & T. Scott Rupp, 2017. "Estimating wildfire response costs in Alaska’s changing climate," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 141(4), pages 783-795, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. M. Flannigan & B. Wotton & G. Marshall & W. de Groot & J. Johnston & N. Jurko & A. Cantin, 2016. "Fuel moisture sensitivity to temperature and precipitation: climate change implications," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 134(1), pages 59-71, January.
    2. Vassiliki Kotroni & Constantinos Cartalis & Silas Michaelides & Julia Stoyanova & Fillipos Tymvios & Antonis Bezes & Theodoros Christoudias & Stavros Dafis & Christos Giannakopoulos & Theodore M. Gian, 2020. "DISARM Early Warning System for Wildfires in the Eastern Mediterranean," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(16), pages 1-30, August.
    3. Vassiliki Varela & Diamando Vlachogiannis & Athanasios Sfetsos & Stelios Karozis & Nadia Politi & Frédérique Giroud, 2019. "Projection of Forest Fire Danger due to Climate Change in the French Mediterranean Region," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(16), pages 1-13, August.
    4. Nikolaos Ntinopoulos & Stavros Sakellariou & Olga Christopoulou & Athanasios Sfougaris, 2023. "Fusion of Remotely-Sensed Fire-Related Indices for Wildfire Prediction through the Contribution of Artificial Intelligence," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(15), pages 1-24, July.
    5. Zhenbo Wang & Xiaorui Zhang & Bo Xu, 2015. "Spatio-Temporal Features of China’s Urban Fires: An Investigation with Reference to Gross Domestic Product and Humidity," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(7), pages 1-19, July.
    6. Emily S Hope & Daniel W McKenney & John H Pedlar & Brian J Stocks & Sylvie Gauthier, 2016. "Wildfire Suppression Costs for Canada under a Changing Climate," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(8), pages 1-18, August.
    7. Megan C. Kirchmeier-Young & Francis W. Zwiers & Nathan P. Gillett & Alex J. Cannon, 2017. "Attributing extreme fire risk in Western Canada to human emissions," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 144(2), pages 365-379, September.
    8. Piyush Jain & Mari R. Tye & Debasish Paimazumder & Mike Flannigan, 2020. "Downscaling fire weather extremes from historical and projected climate models," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 163(1), pages 189-216, November.
    9. Bruno A. Aparício & João A. Santos & Teresa R. Freitas & Ana C. L. Sá & José M. C. Pereira & Paulo M. Fernandes, 2022. "Unravelling the effect of climate change on fire danger and fire behaviour in the Transboundary Biosphere Reserve of Meseta Ibérica (Portugal-Spain)," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 173(1), pages 1-20, July.
    10. Chun Hua Julia Liu & Francesco Pomponi & Bernardino D’Amico, 2023. "The Extent to Which Hemp Insulation Materials Can Be Used in Canadian Residential Buildings," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(19), pages 1-31, October.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:134:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1007_s10584-015-1521-0. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.