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  1. Home
  2. Essential Climate Variables
  3. Fire

Download shortened print version of ECV factsheet (pdf) here.


Data Sources

ECV Products and Requirements


Fire

Fires have impacts on several identified radiative forcing agents. While they can be a natural part of many ecosystems, they have a strong human control, particularly in Tropical ecosystems. Fires contribute to the build-up of CO2 through deforestation and forest degradation, emissions from peatland fires, and alterations of fire regimes(more frequent, larger or more severe fires). They also emit CH4, and are a major source of aerosols, CO and oxides of nitrogen, thus affecting local and regional air quality. Estimates of greenhouse gas emissions due to fires are essential for realistic modelling of climate and its critical component, the global carbon cycle. Fires caused deliberately for land clearance (agriculture and ranching) or accidentally (lightning strikes and human error) are a major factor in land-cover variability and change, and hence affect fluxes of energy and water to the atmosphere.
  Domain: Terrestrial
  Subdomain: Biology
  Scientific Area: Biosphere
  ECV Steward: Emilio Chuvieco-Salinero
  Products:  Burned Area; Active Fire Maps; Fire Radiative Power

 


Average global annual Burned Area

Figure: Average global annual Burned Area obtained from the FireCCI51 product for the period 2001-2017. Burned area detections were based on MODIS 250m near infrared reflectance and thermal anomalies (from Lizundia-Loiola et al., 2019, in review)

EU Copernicus

 

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