Douglas Kelley

Nov 17, 2024 | nature.com | Douglas Kelley |Ning Dong |Chantelle Burton

AbstractExplaining tropical tree cover distribution in areas of intermediate rainfall is challenging, with fire’s role in limiting tree cover particularly controversial. We use a novel Bayesian approach to provide observational constraints on the strength of the influence of humans, fire, rainfall seasonality, heat stress, and wind throw on tropical tree cover.

Oct 21, 2024 | nature.com | Chantelle Burton |Seppe Lampe |Douglas Kelley |Wim Thiery |Stijn Hantson |Lukas Gudmundsson | +11 more

AbstractFire behaviour is changing in many regions worldwide. However, nonlinear interactions between fire weather, fuel, land use, management and ignitions have impeded formal attribution of global burned area changes. Here, we demonstrate that climate change increasingly explains regional burned area patterns, using an ensemble of global fire models.

Oct 3, 2024 | communities.springernature.com | Douglas Kelley |Camilla Mathison |Manoel Cardoso

As we approach the recommended limits of global warming set by the Paris Agreement, with warming already at 1.3°C above Pre-Industrial, our study asks: At what level of global warming do fires affect the world's forests and carbon sinks? Fires are long known for their role in shaping ecosystems and are increasingly seen as a critical factor that could influence the global carbon balance.

Oct 3, 2024 | nature.com | Chantelle Burton |Douglas Kelley |Eleanor Burke |Camilla Mathison |Chris Jones |Richard A. Betts | +1 more

AbstractTo avoid the worst impacts of climate change, the Paris Agreement committed countries to pursue efforts to limit global warming to 1.5 °C by urgently reducing greenhouse gas emissions. However, the Paris temperature ambitions and remaining carbon budgets mostly use models that lack feedback among fire, vegetation and carbon, which are essential for understanding the future resilience of ecosystems.