Evaluation of the Canadian Fire Weather Index in Greece and Future Climate Projections

Abstract

AbstractCurrent trends in the Mediterranean climate and more specifically in Greece indicate longer and more intense summer droughts that even extend out of season. In connection to this, the frequency of forest fire occurrence and intensity is on the rise. In the present study, the Canadian Fire Weather Index (FWI) is used in order to investigate the correlation between fire risk and meteorological conditions in Greece. FWI is a daily meteorologically-based index designed in Canada and used worldwide (including the Mediterranean basin) to estimate fire danger in a generalized fuel type, based solely on weather observations. Here, an evaluation of the index is initially performed for the Greek territory using fire observations that cover a 15-year period. Two threshold values of extreme fire risk are established; FWI = 15 and FWI = 30 increasing from the north-west to the south-east of Greece. Subsequently, a regional climate model is used to provide input for the FWI system to investigate the impacts of climate change on fire risk for two future time periods, 2021–2050 and 2071–2100. Days with extreme fire risk are expected to increase by as many as 45 days per fire season by the end of the century.KeywordsForest FireFire RiskFire OccurrenceFuel MoistureFire Weather IndexThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.