Many calculations of climate change’s economic costs have failed to account for the impacts of wildfires.
of all air pollution. Which is to say that, due to wildfires, Americans in the west are effectively getting twice as much air pollution as their current industrial economy would otherwise require.
Critically, the economic consequences of wildfire smoke extend beyond their direct medical impacts, as people lose time, money, and quality of life to preparing for heavy smoke days, mitigating their effects, canceling plans, and accommodating their impaired health. And yet, many conventional estimates of the economic impacts of wildfires fail to account for these indirect costs, focusing instead on merely the direct “cost of illness.” Afrom the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S.
All this said, it is absolutely true that climate change is not the only driver of the growing frequency and intensity of wildfires. Beginning in the early 20th century, U.S. policymakers attempted to suppress all forest fires including natural wildfires, which serve to periodically clear surface-level vegetation. As Patrick Brown of the Breakthrough Institutebefore the U.S. settlement of the west, much of the region’s pine and mixed-conifer forests experienced fires once every decade.
Decarbonization is not going to make the climate less conducive to wildfires than it is today. It will only limit how much hotter — and thus wildfire prone — the climate becomes. So, any agenda for reducing theharms of wildfires will need to focus on adaptation and mitigation. We need to conduct more controlled burns and thinning in vulnerable forests to limit the severity of wildfires.
Nevertheless, the more we can contain global temperature increases, the fewer days we’ll lose to menacing orange hazes or the illnesses that they cause and exacerbate. The notion that there is a sharp tradeoff between economic prosperity and ecological sustainability is patently misguided. As this week’s costly blazes make clear, few will feel prosperous in a world on fire.Daily news about the politics, business, and technology shaping our world.
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