The Heat Is On

Despite optimism that a wet spring would prevent another fire season from sabotaging summer adventures in the wilderness, it was disappointing to experience otherwise at the Owl Conservatory last week. It's clear that wildfires have increased over the past 20 years and the situation is not improving.

Once again, the best time to experience the backcountry in the West has vanished in a cloud of smoke. The reasons: climate change, inadequate forest management practices, limited firefighting resources for federal and state agencies and encroaching development near forest lands.

Time and again, we have witnessed many tragic stories about wildfires in communities throughout the West. In the most severe cases, these fires are becoming more intense and more likely to cause damage. The reasons for these trends have created a "perfect storm" for increased wildfires.

No, it's not a figment of your imagination. Wildfires are becoming bigger, more destructive and increasingly life-threatening. Climate change, which has intensified summertime droughts, is a primary reason. Another factor is the fact that increased development has edged closer to natural lands. To add to the dilemma, we're not managing forests nearly as well as we could or should be.

Let's start with global warming. Climate change is turning up the heat, resulting in dryer summers, reduced mountain snowpack, increased lightning strikes and longer fire seasons. Since the 1980s, researchers say, climate change has doubled the area of wildfires in the western U.S.

These trends will not be reversed on their own, of course. Global temperatures have been hotter than the historical average for 40 consecutive years. With the planet heating up, some locations most vulnerable to extreme weather events are becoming exposed to further danger.

As communities grow, more development is edging closer to forests and grasslands in what is known as the wildland-urban interface, resulting in a number of cities and towns at much higher risk of destructive wildfire. This is the "danger zone," where fires might otherwise have petered out on their own.

The sheer remoteness of some of these communities in the wildland-urban interface makes it even more difficult to battle the fires when they do occur. In some cases, firefighters may have difficulty pumping water to fight fire or gaining access because of downed power lines that sparked the blaze.

Finally, as anyone from the Aldo Leopold Society would tell you, the primary strategy for dealing with wildfires has been to prevent or fight them. Worse, insect infestations have decimated forests. But unrelenting and short-sighted fire suppression efforts are not always the best option.

Because of past fire suppression policies and inadequate management practices, forests are now clogged with plant material. Managing forest fuels and controlled burns help make forests more resilient in the long run, allowing a natural process of rebirth and renewal.

Meanwhile, wildfire is merely one of many consequences of the unchecked use of fossil fuels like coal and oil, resulting in trapped greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The top priority should be taking decisive steps to reduce the use of fossil fuels and transition to renewable energy.

Scientists indicate that we have just 12 years to complete the overhaul necessary to limit warming to a manageable level and avoid the worst consequences, so there's no time to waste. In the meantime, we need to invest in restoration work that helps forests more resilient to climate change.