Variation of lightning-ignited wildfire patterns under climate change

Francisco J. Pérez-Invernón (), Francisco J. Gordillo-Vázquez, Heidi Huntrieser and Patrick Jöckel
Additional contact information
Francisco J. Pérez-Invernón: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas
Francisco J. Gordillo-Vázquez: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas
Heidi Huntrieser: Deutsche Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt
Patrick Jöckel: Deutsche Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt

Nature Communications, 2023, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Lightning is the main precursor of natural wildfires and Long-Continuing-Current (LCC) lightning flashes are proposed to be the main igniters of lightning-ignited wildfires (LIW). Previous studies predict a change of the global occurrence rate and spatial pattern of total lightning. Nevertheless, the sensitivity of lightning-ignited wildfire occurrence to climate change is uncertain. Here, we investigate space-based measurements of LCC lightning associated with lightning ignitions and present LCC lightning projections under the Representative Concentration Pathway RCP6.0 for the 2090s by applying a recent LCC lightning parameterization based on the updraft strength in thunderstorms. We find a 41% global increase of the LCC lightning flash rate. Increases are largest in South America, the western coast of North America, Central America, Australia, Southern and Eastern Asia, and Europe, while only regional variations are found in northern polar forests, where fire risk can affect permafrost soil carbon release. These results show that lightning schemes including LCC lightning are needed to project the occurrence of lightning-ignited wildfires under climate change.

Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-36500-5 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:14:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-023-36500-5

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-36500-5

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().