Climate change impacts on global wildfire ignitions by lightning and the safe management of landscape fuels
Lead Research Organisation:
University of East Anglia
Department Name: Environmental Sciences
Abstract
2020 will be remembered not only for Covid-19, but also for its devastating wildfires. The year began with the Australian bushfires, which caused 34 deaths and over US$70 billion of damages. The wildfires that are currently burning across the Western US look set to be the costliest in US history, with over 30 people already killed directly. The wildfires of 2020 join a growing list of extreme wildfires seen in Mediterranean Europe, North America, Australia, Siberia and the Arctic in the past decade.
Wildfires are strongly tied to climatic droughts, which enhance the flammability of vegetation. As drought frequency is projected to rise in future, there are serious concerns that the fires seen in recent years are a glimpse into a more fire-prone future. Lightning strikes are the dominant cause of wildfire in many regions and, for example, ignited many of the recent Australian and US fire complexes.
It is critical that we understand the drivers of wildfire, build capacity to predict their future likelihood, and take steps to mitigate their impacts. Our current understanding of fires at the global scale is built around satellite observations. However, these observations are insufficient to disentangle the diverse drivers of fire; they see only patterns. Satellite observations provide a mixed signal of many different types of fire, including wildfires but also a range of fires under human control (e.g. agricultural fires and deforestation fires), meaning that observations of wildfire are 'contaminated' with other fire types. Critically, this obscures trends in wildfire activity and compromises our understanding of climate impacts on wildfire activity.
The proposed project will create the first global capacity to isolate lightning-ignited wildfires from satellite observations. It will use new observations of lightning strikes from ground- and satellite-based lightning sensors to 'decontaminate' satellite observations and introduce a global dataset of lightning-ignited wildfire activity. The new dataset will be used to make key advances in the understanding of wildfires and their relationship with climate. The project will assess how wildfire activity has changed in recent decades, and it will specifically determine the climatic conditions under which lightning fires occur. This new understanding of fire drivers will be built into the UK Earth System model and used to predict the impact of climate change on wildfire activity in the future century.
The new capacity to observe wildfires will also enable a major advance in the estimation of deforestation fire emissions, specifically in Amazonia which accounts around 40% of global emissions due to land use change. Deforestation fire emissions contribute to an increase in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 and contribute to climate change. However, emissions from Amazonian deforestation fires are known to be overestimated because emissions from lightning-ignited wildfires are undesirably included in the estimates. The new record of lightning-ignited wildfires developed in this study will be used to correct the emissions estimates and discount wildfires that occur as part of a natural disturbance-recovery cycle in the region.
Finally, this project will evaluate our future capacity to manage the threats of wildfires in a changing climate using conventional approaches to forest fuel management. It is common in some regions (e.g. Australia and the western US) to manage forest fuel stocks by burning off the most flammable fuels on the forest floor. However, this practice can only be applied safely during cool, moist, wind-free weather that occur in an annual 'window' of opportunity. It is feared that this window will narrow in future due to climate change. In this project, climate model outputs will be used to predict change in the window to 2100, informing forest management agencies of their future challenges and resource needs.
Wildfires are strongly tied to climatic droughts, which enhance the flammability of vegetation. As drought frequency is projected to rise in future, there are serious concerns that the fires seen in recent years are a glimpse into a more fire-prone future. Lightning strikes are the dominant cause of wildfire in many regions and, for example, ignited many of the recent Australian and US fire complexes.
It is critical that we understand the drivers of wildfire, build capacity to predict their future likelihood, and take steps to mitigate their impacts. Our current understanding of fires at the global scale is built around satellite observations. However, these observations are insufficient to disentangle the diverse drivers of fire; they see only patterns. Satellite observations provide a mixed signal of many different types of fire, including wildfires but also a range of fires under human control (e.g. agricultural fires and deforestation fires), meaning that observations of wildfire are 'contaminated' with other fire types. Critically, this obscures trends in wildfire activity and compromises our understanding of climate impacts on wildfire activity.
The proposed project will create the first global capacity to isolate lightning-ignited wildfires from satellite observations. It will use new observations of lightning strikes from ground- and satellite-based lightning sensors to 'decontaminate' satellite observations and introduce a global dataset of lightning-ignited wildfire activity. The new dataset will be used to make key advances in the understanding of wildfires and their relationship with climate. The project will assess how wildfire activity has changed in recent decades, and it will specifically determine the climatic conditions under which lightning fires occur. This new understanding of fire drivers will be built into the UK Earth System model and used to predict the impact of climate change on wildfire activity in the future century.
The new capacity to observe wildfires will also enable a major advance in the estimation of deforestation fire emissions, specifically in Amazonia which accounts around 40% of global emissions due to land use change. Deforestation fire emissions contribute to an increase in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 and contribute to climate change. However, emissions from Amazonian deforestation fires are known to be overestimated because emissions from lightning-ignited wildfires are undesirably included in the estimates. The new record of lightning-ignited wildfires developed in this study will be used to correct the emissions estimates and discount wildfires that occur as part of a natural disturbance-recovery cycle in the region.
Finally, this project will evaluate our future capacity to manage the threats of wildfires in a changing climate using conventional approaches to forest fuel management. It is common in some regions (e.g. Australia and the western US) to manage forest fuel stocks by burning off the most flammable fuels on the forest floor. However, this practice can only be applied safely during cool, moist, wind-free weather that occur in an annual 'window' of opportunity. It is feared that this window will narrow in future due to climate change. In this project, climate model outputs will be used to predict change in the window to 2100, informing forest management agencies of their future challenges and resource needs.
Organisations
- University of East Anglia (Fellow, Lead Research Organisation)
- National Institute for Space Research Brazil (Collaboration)
- Meteorological Office UK (Collaboration)
- University of Zurich (Collaboration)
- Cardiff University (Collaboration)
- Global Carbon Project (Collaboration)
- UK CENTRE FOR ECOLOGY & HYDROLOGY (Collaboration)
- Free University of Amsterdam (Collaboration)
- University of California, Merced (Collaboration)
- SWANSEA UNIVERSITY (Collaboration)
- European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting ECMWF (Collaboration)
People |
ORCID iD |
Matthew Jones (Principal Investigator / Fellow) |
Publications
Mataveli G
(2024)
Deforestation falls but rise of wildfires continues degrading Brazilian Amazon forests
in Global Change Biology
Jones MW
(2023)
National contributions to climate change due to historical emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide since 1850.
in Scientific data
McGrath M
(2023)
The consolidated European synthesis of CO 2 emissions and removals for the European Union and United Kingdom: 1990-2020
in Earth System Science Data
Friedlingstein P
(2023)
Global Carbon Budget 2023
Janssen T
(2023)
Extratropical forests increasingly at risk due to lightning fires
in Nature Geoscience
De Oliveira G
(2023)
Increasing wildfires threaten progress on halting deforestation in Brazilian Amazonia.
in Nature ecology & evolution
Mataveli G
(2023)
Updated Land Use and Land Cover Information Improves Biomass Burning Emission Estimates
in Fire
Friedlingstein P
(2023)
Global Carbon Budget 2023
in Earth System Science Data
Jones M
(2022)
Global and Regional Trends and Drivers of Fire Under Climate Change
in Reviews of Geophysics
Description | BEIS consultation: Climate services for a Net Zero resilient world (CS-N0W) |
Geographic Reach | National |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to a national consultation/review |
Impact | Content of the consultation report us being used to inform BEIS policy on climate change. |
URL | https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/climate-services-for-a-net-zero-resilient-world/cs-n0w-ov... |
Description | NERC-NSF Directed Research Programme Workshop: Directed Research Scoping Workshop |
Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to a national consultation/review |
Impact | Recommendations to NERC & NSF re wildfire as a topic of directed research funding. |
Description | Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report "Taming wildfires in the context of climate change" |
Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to new or improved professional practice |
Impact | The report contributes to formation of public awareness of wildfire causes and influences public policy on climate change/net zero, land management, firefighting services, and disaster management. |
URL | https://www.oecd.org/environment/taming-wildfires-in-the-context-of-climate-change-dd00c367-en.htm |
Description | UK Climate Change Committee / Game and Wildlife Trust Workshop: "Wildfire impact, risk and mitigation." |
Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to a national consultation/review |
Impact | Whitepaper / report summarising policy changes for use by gov departments and the Climate Change Committee. |
URL | https://www.gwct.org.uk/media/1381625/GWCT-Wildfire-workshop-report-and-proceedings-web.pdf |
Description | Whitepaper: "Why Nature? Why Now?" World Resources Institute / Food and Land Use Coalition |
Geographic Reach | National |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to a national consultation/review |
Impact | WRI / FOLU use the reports to influence the environmental policies of government, large enterprises and SME and also produce public products stemming from the "Why Nature? Why Now?" report. |
URL | https://www.foodandlandusecoalition.org/why-nature/ |
Description | ARIES: ADVANCED RESEARCH AND INNOVATION IN ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES |
Amount | £7,227,514 (GBP) |
Funding ID | NE/S007334/1 |
Organisation | Natural Environment Research Council |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 09/2019 |
End | 09/2027 |
Description | Critical Decade for Climate Change Leverhulme Doctoral Scholars |
Amount | £1,350,000 (GBP) |
Funding ID | DS-2020-028 |
Organisation | The Leverhulme Trust |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 09/2022 |
End | 04/2026 |
Description | ESRC-NERC SeNSS-ARIES Joint Studentship |
Amount | £14,512,266 (GBP) |
Funding ID | ES/P00072X/1 |
Organisation | Economic and Social Research Council |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 09/2022 |
End | 04/2026 |
Title | Gridded fossil CO2 emissions and related O2 combustion consistent with national inventories |
Description | Data Access Notice Please note that, at present, the data for a sample of years are provided in this data record due to Zenodo's 50GB data limit. Data for all years 1959-2022 can be accessed via the following link: http://opendap.uea.ac.uk:8080/opendap/hyrax/greenocean/GridFED/GridFEDv2023.1/contents.html Product Description See Jones et al. (2021) for a detailed description of this dataset and the core methods used to produce it. Key details are provided below. GCP-GridFED (version 2023.1) is a gridded fossil emissions dataset that is consistent with the national CO2 emissions reported by the Global Carbon Project (GCP; https://www.globalcarbonproject.org/) in the annual editions of its Global Carbon Budget (Friedlingstein et al., 2023). GCP-GridFEDv2023.1 provides monthly fossil CO2 emissions for the period 1959-2022 at a spatial resolution of 0.1° × 0.1°. The gridded emissions estimates are provided separately for fossil CO2 emitted by the oxidation of oil, coal and natural gas, international bunkers, and the calcination of limestone during cement production. The dataset also includes the cement carbonation sink of CO2. Note that positive values in GridFED signify a surface-to-atmosphere CO2 flux (emissions). Negative values signify an atmosphere-to-surface flux and apply only to the cement carbonation sink. GCP-GridFED also includes gridded uncertainties in CO2 emission, incorporating differences in uncertainty across emissions sectors and countries, and gridded estimates of corresponding O2 uptake based on oxidative ratios for oil, coal and natural gas (see Jones et al., 2021). Core Methodology in Brief GCP-GridFEDv2023.1 was produced by scaling monthly gridded emissions for the year 2010, from the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR v4.3.2; Janssens-Maenhout et al., 2019), to the national annual emissions estimates compiled as part of the 2022 global carbon budget (GCP-NAE) for the years 1959-2022 (Friedlingstein et al., 2023). GCP-GridFEDv2023.1 uses a preliminary release of GCP-NAE covering the years 1959-2022 (timestamp 1st August 2022; an update from Andrew and Peters [2022]). The GCP-NAE estimates for year 2022 are based on data available at the timestamp and the estimates are thus expected to differ somewhat from those that will be presented by Friedlingstein et al. (2023), which will adopt updates to GCP-NAE since the timestamp. For full details of the core methodology, see Jones et al. (2021). Changes to the Seasonality of Emissions in GCP-GridFEDv2022.2 onwards The seasonality of emissions (monthly distribution of annual emissions) for the following countries/sources is now based on the seasonality observed in the Carbon Monitor dataset (Liu et al., 2020; Dou et al., 2022): Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, China, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom, United States. State or province-level data is used for Brazil, China, Russia, and the United States. This also applies for the Bunker Aviation and Bunker Shipping sectors. Seasonality is determined in the following ways for those countries/sources: The seasonality of emissions in 2019-2021 is taken from Carbon Monitor. The seasonality of emissions in all years prior to 2019 is assigned as the average of the seasonality from Carbon Monitor in all years excluding 2020 (due to the impact of COVID-19 on the seasonality of emissions in 2020). For all countries not listed above and all years 1959-2021, GCP-GridFED adopts the seasonality from EDGAR v4.3.2 (year 2010; Janssens-Maenhout et al., 2019) and applies a small correction based on heating/cooling degree days to account for inter-annual climate variability which effects emissions in some sectors (see Jones et al., 2021). Other New Features of GCP-GridFEDv2023.1 There have been no changes to the functionality of the GridFED code in this update (v2023.1) versus the previous update (v2022.2). |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2023 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Dataset used to prepare model simulations for the Global Carbon Budget and for many other science projects, e.g. involving atmospheric inversions and regional emissions estimation.. |
URL | https://zenodo.org/doi/10.5281/zenodo.4277266 |
Title | National contributions to climate change due to historical emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide |
Description | A complete description of the dataset is given by Jones et al. (2023). Key information is provided below. Background A dataset describing the global warming response to national emissions CO2, CH4 and N2O from fossil and land use sources during 1851-2021. National CO2 emissions data are collated from the Global Carbon Project (Andrew and Peters, 2022; Friedlingstein et al., 2022). National CH4 and N2O emissions data are collated from PRIMAP-hist (HISTTP) (Gütschow et al., 2022). We construct a time series of cumulative CO2-equivalent emissions for each country, gas, and emissions source (fossil or land use). Emissions of CH4 and N2O emissions are related to cumulative CO2-equivalent emissions using the Global Warming Potential (GWP*) approach, with best-estimates of the coefficients taken from the IPCC AR6 (Forster et al., 2021). Warming in response to cumulative CO2-equivalent emissions is estimated using the transient climate response to cumulative carbon emissions (TCRE) approach, with best-estimate value of TCRE taken from the IPCC AR6 (Forster et al., 2021, Canadell et al., 2021). 'Warming' is specifically the change in global mean surface temperature (GMST). The data files provide emissions, cumulative emissions and the GMST response by country, gas (CO2, CH4, N2O or 3-GHG total) and source (fossil emissions, land use emissions or the total). Data records: overview The data records include three comma separated values (.csv) files as described below. All files are in 'long' format with one value provided in the Data column for each combination of the categorical variables Year, Country Name, Country ISO3 code, Gas, and Component columns. Component specifies fossil emissions, LULUCF emissions or total emissions of the gas. Gas specifies CO2, CH4, N2O or the three-gas total (labelled 3-GHG). Country ISO3 codes are specifically the unique ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 codes of each country. Data records: specifics EMISSIONS_ANNUAL_1830-2021.csv: Data includes annual emissions of CO2 (Pg CO2 year-1), CH4 (Tg CH4 year-1) and N2O (Tg N2O year-1) during 1830-2021. The Data column provides values for every combination of the categorical variables. EMISSIONS_CUMULATIVE_CO2e100_1851-2021.csv: Data includes the cumulative CO2 equivalent emissions in units Pg CO2-e100 during 1851-2021. The Data column provides values for every combination of the categorical variables. GMST_response_1851-2021.csv: Data includes the change in global mean surface temperature (GMST) due to emissions of the three gases during 1851-2021 in units °C. The Data column provides values for every combination of the categorical variables. Accompanying Code Code is available at: https://github.com/jonesmattw/National_Warming_Contributions . The code requires Input.zip to run (see README at the GitHub link). Further info: Country Groupings We also provide estimates of the contributions of various country groupings as defined by the UNFCCC: Annex I countries (number of countries, n = 42) Annex II countries (n = 23) economies in transition (EITs; n = 15) the least developed countries (LDCs; n = 47) the like-minded developing countries (LMDC; n = 24). And other country groupings: the organisation for economic co-operation and development (OECD; n = 38) the European Union (EU27 post-Brexit) the Brazil, South Africa, India and China (BASIC) group. See COUNTRY_GROUPINGS.xlsx for the lists of countries in each group. |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2023 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/7076346 |
Title | National contributions to climate change due to historical emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide |
Description | Background A dataset describing the global warming response to national emissions CO2, CH4 and N2O from fossil and land use sources during 1871-2021. National CO2 emissions data are collated from the Global Carbon Project (Andrew and Peters, 2022; Friedlingstein et al., 2022). National CH4 and N2O emissions data are collated from PRIMAP-hist (HISTTP) (Gütschow et al., 2022). We construct a time series of cumulative CO2-equivalent emissions for each country, gas, and emissions source (fossil or land use). Emissions of CH4 and N2O emissions are related to cumulative CO2-equivalent emissions using the Global Warming Potential (GWP*) approach, with best-estimates of the coefficients taken from the IPCC AR6 (Forster et al., 2021). Warming in response to cumulative CO2-equivalent emissions is estimated using the transient climate response to cumulative carbon emissions (TCRE) approach, with best-estimate value of TCRE taken from the IPCC AR6 (Forster et al., 2021, Canadell et al., 2021). 'Warming' is specifically the change in global mean surface temperature (GMST). The data files provide emissions, cumulative emissions and the GMST response by country, gas (CO2, CH4, N2O or 3-GHG total) and source (fossil emissions of land use emissions). A complete description of the dataset is under consideration for publication. A link will be provided here upon publication. Data records: overview The data records include three comma separated values (.csv) files as described below. All files are in 'long' format with one value provided in the Data column for each combination of the categorical variables Year, Country Name, Country ISO3 code, Gas, and Component columns. Component specifies fossil emissions, LULUCF emissions or total emissions of the gas. Gas specifies CO2, CH4, N2O or the three-gas total (labelled 3-GHG). Country ISO3 codes are specifically the unique ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 codes of each country. Data records: specifics EMISSIONS_ANNUAL_1850-2021.csv: Data includes annual emissions of CO2 (Pg CO2 year-1), CH4 (Tg CH4 year-1) and N2O (Tg N2O year-1) during 1850-2021. The Data column provides values for every combination of the categorical variables. EMISSIONS_CUMULATIVE_CO2e100_1871-2021.csv: Data includes the cumulative CO2 equivalent emissions in units Pg CO2-e100 during 1871-2021. The Data column provides values for every combination of the categorical variables. GMST_response_1871-2021.csv: Data includes the change in global mean surface temperature (GMST) due to emissions of the three gases during 1871-2021 in units °C. The Data column provides values for every combination of the categorical variables. Accompanying Code Code is available at: https://github.com/jonesmattw/National_Warming_Contributions . The code requires Input.zip to run (see README at the GitHub link). Further info: Country Groupings We also provide estimates of the contributions of various country groupings as defined by the UNFCCC: Annex I countries (number of countries, n = 42) Annex II countries (n = 23) economies in transition (EITs; n = 15) the least developed countries (LDCs; n = 47) the like-minded developing countries (LMDC; n = 24) as defined by the UNFCCC. And other country groupings: the organisation for economic co-operation and development (OECD; n = 38) the European Union (EU27 post-Brexit) the Brazil, South Africa, India and China (BASIC) group. See COUNTRY_GROUPINGS.xlsx for the lists of countries in each group. |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2023 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Used by US State Department and the Government of Vanuatu to prepare for UNFCCC COP 2023, which focussed on loss and damage. |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/7076347 |
Description | Collaboration with Alysha Coppola at UTH Zurich |
Organisation | University of Zurich |
Country | Switzerland |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | - Co-author on a global review of the black carbon cycle. - Lead author on a global-scale analysis of dissolved black carbon export. - Co-author on an analysis of dissolved black carbon export from Amazonia. - Co-author on an analysis dissolved black carbon export from North America (in preparation) |
Collaborator Contribution | - Lead author on a global review of the black carbon cycle. - Lead author on an analysis dissolved black carbon export from Amazonia. - Co-author on a global-scale analysis of dissolved black carbon export. - Lead author on an analysis dissolved black carbon export from North America (in preparation) |
Impact | - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-11543-9 - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-16576-z - https://www.nature.com/articles/s43017-022-00316-6 |
Start Year | 2018 |
Description | Global Carbon Project |
Organisation | Global Carbon Project |
Country | Australia |
Sector | Learned Society |
PI Contribution | - Member of the global carbon project - Contribute to annual publications of the global carbon budget - Contribute to media effort associated with publications of the global carbon budget - Attend UNFCCC COP events to unveil the global carbon budget - Co-author of 4 global carbon budget papers - Co-author of 2 papers connected to the global carbon budget - Lead author of two papers connected to the global carbon budget |
Collaborator Contribution | - We annually publish the global carbon budget - We engage with the media upon publication of the global carbon budget - Global carbon budget is unveiled annually at UNFCCC COP events |
Impact | - https://essd.copernicus.org/articles/11/1783/2019/ - https://essd.copernicus.org/articles/12/3269/2020/ - https://essd.copernicus.org/articles/14/1917/2022/ - https://essd.copernicus.org/articles/14/4811/2022/ - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-020-%200797-x - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-021-01001-0 - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-020-00779-6 |
Start Year | 2019 |
Description | Partnership with Chantelle Burton, UK Met Office |
Organisation | Meteorological Office UK |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Collaborator Contribution | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Impact | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Start Year | 2023 |
Description | Partnership with Douglas Kelley at UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology |
Organisation | UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Collaborator Contribution | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Impact | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Start Year | 2023 |
Description | Partnership with Francesca Di Giuseppe, ECMWF |
Organisation | European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting ECMWF |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Collaborator Contribution | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Impact | We collaborate on an upcoming annual scientific report, the "State of Wildfires", as part of a network including myself (UEA), Douglas Kelley (CEH), Francesca Di Giuseppe (ECMWF) and Chantelle Burton (UK Met Office). |
Start Year | 2023 |
Description | Partnership with John Abatzoglou and Crystal Kolden, UC Merced |
Organisation | University of California, Merced |
Country | United States |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | - Authored one paper. - Leading a proposal for NERC Pushing the Frontiers. |
Collaborator Contribution | - Co-authorship of one paper. Partners provided data, wrote sections of text, provided feedback and comments. - John is contributing as Co-I on a proposal I am preparing for NERC. |
Impact | https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2020RG000726 |
Start Year | 2020 |
Description | Partnership with Luiz Aragão and Liana Anderson, INPE |
Organisation | National Institute for Space Research Brazil |
Country | Brazil |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | - Leading 3 papers (in preparation) |
Collaborator Contribution | - Co-authors on 3 papers (in preparation) - Postdoc will visit UEA for one year and engage in joint research under my supervision (subject to sign-off on funding from FAPESP) |
Impact | - 3 papers (in preparation) - 1 postdoc exchange (subject to sign-off on funding from FAPESP) |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | Partnership with Niels Andela |
Organisation | Cardiff University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | - Lead author on 3 papers (2 in preparation) - Co-developer of model code (Global Fire Atlas) |
Collaborator Contribution | - Co-author on 3 papers (2 in preparation) - Access to model code (Global Fire Atlas) |
Impact | - https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2020RG000726 |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | Partnership with Sander Veraverbeke and Guido van der Werf, VU Amsterdam |
Organisation | Free University of Amsterdam |
Country | Netherlands |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | - Joint purchase ($50,000 contribution) of global lightning dataset - Lead author 3 papers (2 published, 1 under revision) - Co-author 1 paper (under revision) |
Collaborator Contribution | - Joint purchase ($50,000 contribution) of global lightning dataset - Co-author 3 papers - Lead author 1 paper (under revision) |
Impact | - https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2020RG000726 - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-019-0403-x |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Partnership with Stefan Doerr and Cristina Santín, Swansea University |
Organisation | Swansea University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | - Lead author of 3 papers |
Collaborator Contribution | - Co-author of 1 paper |
Impact | - https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2020RG000726 - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-019-0403-x - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-16576-z - https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.1029/2020GB006647 |
Start Year | 2019 |
Description | BBC News Bulletin - Consulted by the programme's researchers for data and statistics describing the extremity of the 2023 wildfire season in the northern hemisphere |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | Consulted by the programme's researchers for data and statistics describing the extremity of the 2023 wildfire season in the northern hemisphere. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | Expert Reaction used: 'Meteorological mayhem' set to rock Britain 'climate breakdown' hits |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | Issued rapid reaction to Science Media Centre, published by The Express. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1654339/uk-weather-forecast-latest-climate-change-temperatures-upd... |
Description | Expert Reaction used: How drones, robots and AI are used to tackle wildfires |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | Expert reaction provided to Science Media Centre and used by 6 outlets |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://research-portal.uea.ac.uk/en/clippings/how-drones-robots-and-ai-are-used-to-tackle-wildfires... |
Description | Greece wildfires: how climate change is involved, and what we can do about it |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Article in The Conversation: "Greece wildfires: how climate change is involved, and what we can do about it" |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://theconversation.com/greece-wildfires-how-climate-change-is-involved-and-what-we-can-do-about... |
Description | Interview: BBC weather world, broadcast on BBC World News / BBC News / Breakfast / Regional News |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | Interviewed by the BBC during the UK, European and North American wildfires summer 2022. Segment broadcast on all BBC TV channels multiple times over 2-3 days. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001bmm7/weather-world-august-2022 |
Description | Invited Talk: Fate of Pyrogenic Carbon in the Earth System, École Normale Supérieure (ENS), Paris, January 2023 |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | Gave talk in Paris, hybrid. Scientific and wider audience of those following research on pyrogenic carbon. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Invited Talk: Re-imagining Global Pyromes, Brazilian Institute for Space Research (INPE) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | Gave talk at INPE during research visit. Hybrid event - wider scientific / third sector audience. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | Invited Talk: Re-imagining Global Pyromes, US National Academies workshop on GHG emissions from wildland fires |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | Invited to talk by the US National Academies workshop on GHG emissions from wildland fires. See report by Carbon Brief in link. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://www.carbonbrief.org/qa-how-scientists-tackle-the-challenges-of-estimating-wildfire-co2-emiss... |
Description | Press release: Wildfire risk has grown nearly everywhere, but we can still influence where and how fires strike |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | PR Covered by 49 outlets worldwide including BBC online |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://research-portal.uea.ac.uk/en/persons/matthew-jones/clippings/ |
Description | Taming wildfires in the context of climate change |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | Contributed to the OECD Environment Directorate report "Taming wildfires in the context of climate change". Provided data visuals and reviewed report. First two figures in summary for policymakers are mine. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/dd00c367-en.pdf?expires=1710428136&id=id&accname=oid033621&c... |
Description | The Conversation: Climate change: wildfire risk has grown nearly everywhere - but we can still influence where and how fires strike |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Article to convey take-homes our review article https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2020RG000726 |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://theconversation.com/climate-change-wildfire-risk-has-grown-nearly-everywhere-but-we-can-stil... |
Description | Workshop: UK Committee on Climate Change - Wildfire Impact, Risk and Mitigation Workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | UK CCC event at the Royal Geographical Society, financed by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust. Among experts invited to contribute to policy workshop on wildfire risk reduction in the UK. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |