The catastrophic fires raging across the southern half of the continent are largely the result of rising temperatures. The fires raging across the southern half of the Australian continent this year have so far burned through more than 5 million hectares. To put that in context, the catastrophic 2018 fire season in California saw nearly 740,000 hectaresburned. Australia’s climate has warmed by more than one degree Celsius over the past century, and this change has caused an increase in the frequency and intensity of heat waves.
By Nerilie Abram. Scientific American. December 31, 2019.
