London. Feb. 2025. A newly published study in Nature, Parks, et al, “A fire deficit persists across diverse North American Forests,” indicates that wildfire burns were some four times more prevalent between 1600 and 1880 than today.
This new study relies on a tree ring dataset . The result is consistent with prior studies of ice core samples which showed (by examining ash layers in the ice) that earth was far smokier prior to the industrial revolution than it is today.
This means that humans are net controllers and suppressors of wildfires. The industrial revolution (and fossil fuels) have not increased wildfires; they have decreased wildfires.
