Adding Fuel to the Fire

I have alienated most of my right-leaning friends, now I’ll work on the other side.

I’m a bipartisan kind of guy. 


Let’s talk climate change, specifically wildfire.


We all agree that for wildfires to burn hot, spread, and be destructive you need to have fuel as well as generally warm and dry conditions. This is why there are seldom wildfires in the desert. Although conditions are hot and dry, there is little fuel, because it is hot and dry. The fuel needed for a wildfire never reaches a critical mass.


So let’s look at the recent fires in California. People make a case that they are driven by climate change/global warming. I believe there is some truth in that. The August lightning storms that came through California were unusual. I have never seen that kind of weather in summer in California. Of course, if you attribute a weather event to climate change, it is disingenuous to say that other weather events are only weather—such as unseasonable snowstorms. If you do, you have an unfalsifiable hypothesis, and you are out of the realm of science and into superstition.


But that’s all a digression. Those lightning storms were the match that lit the fuel. If not for the lightning storms, it would have been a cigarette, or a power line, or a gender reveal gone awry, or a hot muffler. The point is that when you have a large fuel load, it will get lit at some point. It is inevitable.


I have read that pre-1800, approximately 5 million acres burned in California every year (https://www.sierraforestlegacy.org/Resources/Conservation/FireForestEcology/FireScienceResearch/FireHistory/FireHistory-Stephens07.pdf 1.8 million hectares (>4 million acres). In 2019, 259,000 acres burned. In 2020, over 4,000,000 acres have burned so far.


So we should stop burning fossil fuels and go all renewable, right? That's what the scientists are telling us. (I know that's a strawman argument, but work with me).


There's a big problem with that. 


Imagine I could wave a magic wand and the whole US is renewable energy. We still have the problem with fuel. The weather patterns do not change overnight. There will be decades of the weather patterns we are seeing today. Even if I 100% agreed that going renewable right now was the thing to do, it doesn't solve the near-term problem. Going renewable does NOTHING in terms of helping to prevent wildfires for a generation or more.


Likewise, if sea level is rising catastrophically, simply stopping our burning of fossil fuels doesn't fix it. They have been rising since 1800 and will keep rising for decades. If we want to protect, we need hardware like dikes and dams to protect our fossil fuel habits will not stop it.


We absolutely must take steps to harden our ability to cope with a changing climate, regardless of the cause. In the case of California, this means prescribed burns or clearing. For Florida, it may mean walls near the ocean and bays. New Orleans needs more pumps and higher walls. These responses will be expensive and uncomfortable for many.


This same principle holds true for flooding, heatwaves, and unusual weather of any type. While I am not convinced that eschewing fossil fuels (especially natural gas) will be particularly beneficial in the long term, I know that transitioning will not help our short term problems at all.



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