Major Reason Behind Wildfire In Australia

Bushfires are a natural phenomenon that takes place every year. These have been responsible for shaping the Australian nature over millions of years. From 1st November 2019 to 31st January 2020, the fires raged at unprecedented scales. Over the past century, the Australian climate has been warmed, leading to an increased frequency and intensity of droughts and heatwaves.

Heat and drought create conditions that lead to an increased risk of bushfires. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded - in the 2000s - that the ongoing climate change will lead to an increase in the intensity and frequency of the fires. These fires were a display of the increased intensity which we are about to tackle in the future.

In the recent bushfires that raged for several weeks, over 1 billion animals have died, destroying over 5,900 buildings including over 2,800 homes, over 18 million hectares of land have burned.

Bushfires happen naturally but the scale which they touched, has certainly been aggravated due to climate change. Climate change worsens drought conditions, resulting in lower annual rainfall. Data from the Australian Bureau Of Meteorology shows that 2019 was Australia's hottest year on record since 1990 and had 40% less rainfall than average.

Apart from less rainfall, even increased average temperature and strong winds contribute to an even higher risk of bushfires. Scientists warn that the current bushfires which were fueled due to the outcomes of climate change have released massive amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. This would further amplify climate change and lead to more catastrophic events.

While it is undeniably true that the Australian bushfires are not caused primarily due to climate change and human actions, we cannot deny the fact that the conditions and scale of the fires have been worsened due to impacts of climate change on the environment.

It is now upon us, to either ignore the undeniable fact that climate change has worsened these conditions or to accept the truth and initiate more efforts towards combating this problem.
Hopefully, we understand the gravity of this situation and choose the latter to protect ourselves and the planet.

By: Vithal Goel

School: Delhi Public School, GBN

Class: 11th