Local factors mediate climate and land use effects on global fire regimes (2003-2020)

Local factors mediate climate and land use effects on global fire regimes (2003-2020) | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Local factors mediate climate and land use effects on global fire regimes (2003-2020) Adam Mahood, Ty Tuff, Megan Cattau, Virginia Iglesias, Thomas Hanson, and 8 more This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-3870398/v2 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 2 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Show more versions Abstract Changes in fire activity challenge policymakers, land managers and the general public. Burned area (BA) is declining globally, but 81% of BA occurs in just 22 countries, and growth rate may be more important for public safety. We used eight fire regime components from country-level datasets to characterize fire regimes for 241 countries from 2003-2020. Fire regimes followed two axes of variation, with BA versus event duration on one axis, and season length versus event size and spread rate on the other. Annual trends in fire regime components were mixed, with no trend being most common, as expected given the short time series. Increases in fire activity were associated with increases in aridity in boreal, temperate and equatorial countries, and with land cover changes in arid countries. But these associations explained <40% of model variation, indicating that local and regional circumstances are more important than broad generalizations from global models. Earth and environmental sciences/Ecology/Fire ecology Earth and environmental sciences/Climate sciences/Climate change/Climate-change impacts/Environmental health Full Text Additional Declarations The authors declare no competing interests. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 2 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Show more versions Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-3870398","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":268710877,"identity":"03f31a4f-69b3-443d-b001-a13b3d62dd26","order_by":0,"name":"Adam 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