130157 20241125101125.0 doi 10.1016/J.SCITOTENV.2022.160320 sideral 131857 ART-2023-131857 eng Rodrigues, Marcos Universidad de Zaragoza (orcid)0000-0002-0477-0796 Drivers and implications of the extreme 2022 wildfire season in Southwest Europe 2023 Access copy available to the general public Unrestricted Wildfire is a common phenomenon in Mediterranean countries but the 2022 fire season has been extreme in southwest Europe (Portugal, Spain and France). Here we provide a preliminary but comprehensive analysis of 2022's wildfire season in southwest Europe. Burned area has exceeded the 2001–2021 median by a factor of 52 in some regions and large wildfires (>500 ha) started to occur in June–July, earlier than the traditional fire season. These anomalies were associated with record-breaking values of fuel dryness, atmospheric water demand and pyrometeorological conditions. Live fuel moisture content was below the historical minima for almost 50 % of the season in some regions. A few large wildfires were responsible for 82 % of the burned area and, in turn, 47 % of the area burned occurred in protected areas. Shrublands, transitional woodlands and conifer forests (but not eucalypt plantations) were the land cover types most affected by extreme fires. As climate change intensifies, we can expect such fire seasons to become the new normal in large parts of the continent, potentially leading to major negative impacts on rural economies. These results highlight the need for landscape level fuel management also in protected areas, to avoid fire-induced biodiversity losses and landscape scale degradation. Our results have important policy implications and indicate that fire prevention should be explicitly addressed within continental forest legislation and strategies. info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/101003890/EU/FIREURISK - DEVELOPING A HOLISTIC, RISK-WISE STRATEGY FOR EUROPEAN WILDFIRE MANAGEMENT/FirEUrisk This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No H2020 101003890-FirEUrisk info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/101037419/EU/Innovative technologies and socio-ecological-economic solutions for fire resilient territories in Europe./FIRE-RES This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No H2020 101037419-FIRE-RES info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/ES/MICINN/PID2020-116556RA-I00 info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/ES/MICINN/RTI2018-094691-B-C31 info:eu-repo/semantics/embargoedAccess by-nc-nd http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/ 8.2 2023 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES 31 / 358 = 0.087 2023 Q1 T1 1.998 2023 Environmental Chemistry 2023 Q1 Waste Management and Disposal 2023 Q1 Pollution 2023 Q1 Environmental Engineering 2023 Q1 17.6 2023 info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersion Cunill Camprubí, Àngel Balaguer-Romano, Rodrigo Coco Megía, Celso J. Castañares, Francisco Ruffault, Julien Fernandes, Paulo M. Resco de Dios, Víctor 3006 010 Universidad de Zaragoza Dpto. Geograf. Ordenac.Territ. Área Análisis Geográfico Regi. 859, Part 2 (2023), 160320 [7 pp.] Sci. total environ. SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT 0048-9697 893589 http://zaguan.unizar.es/record/130157/files/texto_completo.pdf Postprint info:eu-repo/date/embargoEnd/2025-01-10 1276025 http://zaguan.unizar.es/record/130157/files/texto_completo.jpg?subformat=icon icon Postprint info:eu-repo/date/embargoEnd/2025-01-10 oai:zaguan.unizar.es:130157 articulos driver 2024-11-22-11:57:25 ARTICLE