Climate change doubled likelihood of Canada’s extreme fire weather, study finds
Human-induced climate change has more than doubled the likelihood of the extreme weather conditions that fueled Canada’s destructive 2026 wildfire season, finds a rapid analysis. As of early August, thousands of wildfires torched more than 3.8 million hectares (9.4 million acres) across the country — an area already significantly in excess of Canada’s 30-year annual […]
A study conducted by World Weather Attribution has found that climate change has more than doubled the likelihood of the extreme fire weather conditions that contributed to Canada's devastating 2026 wildfire season. The analysis, which examined the daily severity rating (DSR) metric, which factors in temperature, wind, humidity, and dryness to gauge fire suppression difficulty, indicates that such fires are now expected to occur every two to six years in the Northwest Territories and every six to 15 years in Ontario.
Before the advent of climate change, these fires would have been expected to occur every 50 years or so. Theodore Keeping, a research associate at Imperial College London, emphasized that the findings provide further evidence that the shift towards more extreme fire weather conditions is due to climate change.
Brief written by urgent.news from Mongabay's own syndicated text. Machine-written — it may contain errors, so check the original before relying on it.
