‘Hotter, Drier, and More Flammable’: Climate Change Played a Role in LA Fire, New Study Finds

Hot, dry, and windy conditions that fuelled the recent LA fires were made about 35% more likely due to human-made warming, a new study has confirmed.

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Reduced rainfall and an abundance of dry vegetation due to human-induced climate change have worsened the recent LA wildfires, a new study has confirmed as it warned of escalating fire conditions as the climate crisis worsens.

Powerful Santa Ana winds – dry, warm winds that originate from the western desert interior of the US and are common this time of year – fanned the devastating fires, allowing them to spread rapidly across more than 57,000 acres and kill at least 29 people. The winds, coupled with an abundance in tinder-dry vegetation and heat, made for one of the city’s costliest fire events in the US history.

But while wildfires in Southern California are not uncommon, they are more likely to occur because of climate change, as suggested in a new study.

Researchers at World Weather Attribution (WWA), an academic collaboration studying extreme event attribution, found that the hot, dry, and windy conditions that fuelled the recent fires were made about 35% more likely due to human-made warming, which is primarily driven by the burning of fossil fuels – coal, oil, and natural gas.

When the fires started on January 7, LA County was tinder dry after experiencing its hottest summer in at least 130 years and receiving only 0.16 inches (4.1mm) of rain since last May. The region typically sees the bulk of its precipitation between October and April, but, as Glen MacDonald, a geography professor at UCLA, told The Atlantic last month, “[y]ou’d have to go to the late 1800s to see this dry of a start to the rainy season.”

According to WWA, the region is now 2.4 times more likely to experience a dry winter compared to pre-industrial times. This also translates into a much longer wildfire season – about 23 days longer, on average, compared to pre-industrial times, according to the study.

More on the topic: 3 Facts About California’s Climate That Explain the LA Fires

So far, the world has warmed by 1.2C compared to pre-industrial times, with scientists warning that every fraction of a degree of warming will cause discernible increases in the frequency and severity of heat extremes, heavy rainfall events, and regional droughts. If warming increases to the projected 2.6C by 2100, the fire-prone conditions that have fuelled the LA fires will become a further 35% more likely, says WWA.

Researchers have already linked the climate emergency to a 172% increase in burned areas in California since the 1970s, and the situation is only expected to worsen in the years to come. “Without a faster transition away from planet-heating fossil fuels, California will continue to get hotter, drier, and more flammable,” said Clair Barnes, a WWA researcher at the Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial College London.

Globally, extreme fires are set to increase by up to 14% by the decade’s end, 30% by mid-century, and 50% by 2100, according to the UN Environment Programme.

Featured image: CAL FIRE_Official/Flickr.