Climate change will boost number of US West's wildfires

According to researchers, climate change will increase wildfires in the western parts of the USA, reports AlertNet. "In the long run, we found what most fear - increasing fire activity across large areas of the planet. But the speed and extent to which some of these changes may happen is surprising," said Max Moritz, one of the writers of the report from the University of California-Berkeley. The authors used satellite-based fire records and 16 climate change models in their research. The study concluded that while in the Equator region fire risk may decrease due to increased rainfall by the end of the century, many temperate zones will see more wildfires due to the rising temperatures.

Scientists predict that global warming will bring about not only growing wildfire risk, but also severe storms, floods and droughts.