Climate change and fires in the Ukrainian Polissia region
Loading...
Date
2023
Authors
Karamushka, Victor
Kuchma, Tetyana
Boychenko, Svitlana
Nazarova, Olga
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
Climate change accompanied by anomalously high temperatures and a decrease in precipitation during the warm season can have serious consequences for Ukrainian Polissia, including an increased risk of forest and peat fires, deterioration of ecosystem integrity, changes of biodiversity patterns, etc. An average temperature increase of 0.60°C per decade was observed in the Ukrainian Polissia region along with an annual precipitation decrease ranging from 2 to 4% over the period from 1990 to 2021. The prevailing weather conditions in 2020 included snowless warm winter, warm arid spring (in particular, in March and April), and certain accompanying synoptic conditions (e.g., high wind speeds up to 15–20 m/s). Such conditions contributed to the forest fires and a powerful dust storms in most regions of the Ukrainian Polissia. During the spring 2020, more than half of the territory of Ukrainian Polissia was exposed to fires. The climatic conditions of spring 2022 were not as dry as in 2020, however, due to the war, fires engulfed a significant part of the territory of Kyiv and Chernihiv Polissia. Analysis of the spatial distribution of the fire frequency in the regions of Ukrainian Polissia in 2020 and 2022 (based on the satellite data) points out the dominance of different fire-promoting factors: in 2020, it was weather anomalies, in 2022 - human activities (armed hostilities).
Description
Keywords
ecosystem integrity, Chernihiv Polissia, fire-promoting factors, fires due to war, conference materials
Citation
Climate change and fires in the Ukrainian Polissia region / V. Karamushka, T. Kuchma, S. Boychenko, O. Nazarova // XVII International Scientific Conference "Monitoring of Geological Processes and Ecological Condition of the Environment", 7–10 November 2023, Kyiv, Ukraine. - 2023. - P. [1-5]. - https://doi.org/10.3997/2214-4609.2023520235