Klimaforandringer angives som medvirkende årsag til de senere års kæmpe skovbrande i f.eks. Australien og Rusland. Men skovbrandene bidrager muligvis i sig selv til klimaforandringer. FNs Fødevare- og Landbrugsorganisation, FAO, slår til lyd for overvågning af CO2-udledninger fra skovbrande og forbedrede beredskaber.
Whilst changing climatic conditions may be exacerbating the growing number of mega-fires round the world, these fires may also themselves be a contributing factor to global warming, said FAO in a report presented Tuesday at the 5th International Wildland Fire Conference in Sun City, South Africa.
The agency called upon countries to implement more comprehensive fire management strategies and improve the monitoring of wildfire carbon gas emissions that cause global warming.
– Mega-fires are mainly caused by humans and are likely exacerbated by climate change, but now we suspect they may also in themselves represent a vicious circle that is speeding up global warming, said Pieter van Lierop, FAO Forestry Officer.
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– With an increasing incidence in the frequency and size of mega-fires along with weather projections indicating hotter and drier fire seasons, the issue is becoming urgent, he said.
Recent examples of mega-fires include the 2009 Black Saturday conflagration in Australia which killed 173 people and incinerated many towns, and record-setting wildfires in Russia last year, where 62 people were killed and around 2.3 million hectares burned as a result of over 32 000 fires.
The report, entitled “Findings and Implications from a Coarse-Scale Global Assessment of Recent Selected Mega-Fires”, studies recent fires in Australia, Botswana, Brazil, Indonesia, Israel, Greece, Russia, and the United States.
