Active Fire Dynamics in the Amazon: New Perspectives From High-Resolution Satellite Observations

Wenxuan Xu; Yongxue Liu; Sander Veraverbeke; Wei Wu; Yanzhu Dong; Wanyun Lu

doi:10.1029/2021GL093789

Active Fire Dynamics in the Amazon: New Perspectives From High-Resolution Satellite Observations

Wenxuan Xu
, Yongxue Liu^*
, Sander Veraverbeke
, Wei Wu
, Yanzhu Dong
, Wanyun Lu

^*Corresponding author for this work

Earth and Climate

Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

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Abstract

The Amazon region is expected to become an amplified fire-prone system, but the mechanism of fire occurrence is not fully understood. Here, we employed more than 300,000 Sentinel-2 images acquired during 2016–2019 and compiled a high-resolution inventory of active fires (AFs) over the Amazon. We found that the fire activities in the Amazon in 2019 did not stand out compared with those in 2017 as a whole. However, the number of fires increased in 2019 in the absence of an exceptional drought, suggesting increased human disturbance in the Amazon. The high-resolution AF inventory further demonstrated that over 90% of detected AFs were associated with humans clearing deforested fields on forest fringes for agricultural land expansion. Additionally, our inventory indicated that satellite sensors with coarser spatial resolution could miss considerable small fires, especially at the sensitive agriculture–forest interface, which therefore should be targeted as a priority conservation area.

Original language	English
Article number	e2021GL093789
Pages (from-to)	1-11
Number of pages	11
Journal	Geophysical Research Letters
Volume	48
Issue number	20
Early online date	10 Oct 2021
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1029/2021GL093789
Publication status	Published - 28 Oct 2021

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This study was supported by the Key Research and Development Program of China (grant no. 2019YFA0606601), the Nanjing University Innovation Program for the Ph.D. candidate (award CXYJ21‐43), the China Scholarship Council (CSC) (grant no. 202006190242), the Key Laboratory of Surveying and Mapping Science and Geospatial Information Technology of Ministry of Natural Resources (grant no. 2020‐3‐1).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.

Funding

This study was supported by the Key Research and Development Program of China (grant no. 2019YFA0606601), the Nanjing University Innovation Program for the Ph.D. candidate (award CXYJ21‐43), the China Scholarship Council (CSC) (grant no. 202006190242), the Key Laboratory of Surveying and Mapping Science and Geospatial Information Technology of Ministry of Natural Resources (grant no. 2020‐3‐1).

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 15 Life on Land

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10.1029/2021GL093789

Active Fire Dynamics in the AmazonFinal published version, 15.8 MBLicence: Article 25fa Dutch Copyright Act

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title = "Active Fire Dynamics in the Amazon: New Perspectives From High-Resolution Satellite Observations",

abstract = "The Amazon region is expected to become an amplified fire-prone system, but the mechanism of fire occurrence is not fully understood. Here, we employed more than 300,000 Sentinel-2 images acquired during 2016–2019 and compiled a high-resolution inventory of active fires (AFs) over the Amazon. We found that the fire activities in the Amazon in 2019 did not stand out compared with those in 2017 as a whole. However, the number of fires increased in 2019 in the absence of an exceptional drought, suggesting increased human disturbance in the Amazon. The high-resolution AF inventory further demonstrated that over 90\% of detected AFs were associated with humans clearing deforested fields on forest fringes for agricultural land expansion. Additionally, our inventory indicated that satellite sensors with coarser spatial resolution could miss considerable small fires, especially at the sensitive agriculture–forest interface, which therefore should be targeted as a priority conservation area.",

author = "Wenxuan Xu and Yongxue Liu and Sander Veraverbeke and Wei Wu and Yanzhu Dong and Wanyun Lu",

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N1 - Funding Information: This study was supported by the Key Research and Development Program of China (grant no. 2019YFA0606601), the Nanjing University Innovation Program for the Ph.D. candidate (award CXYJ21‐43), the China Scholarship Council (CSC) (grant no. 202006190242), the Key Laboratory of Surveying and Mapping Science and Geospatial Information Technology of Ministry of Natural Resources (grant no. 2020‐3‐1). Publisher Copyright: © 2021. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.

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N2 - The Amazon region is expected to become an amplified fire-prone system, but the mechanism of fire occurrence is not fully understood. Here, we employed more than 300,000 Sentinel-2 images acquired during 2016–2019 and compiled a high-resolution inventory of active fires (AFs) over the Amazon. We found that the fire activities in the Amazon in 2019 did not stand out compared with those in 2017 as a whole. However, the number of fires increased in 2019 in the absence of an exceptional drought, suggesting increased human disturbance in the Amazon. The high-resolution AF inventory further demonstrated that over 90% of detected AFs were associated with humans clearing deforested fields on forest fringes for agricultural land expansion. Additionally, our inventory indicated that satellite sensors with coarser spatial resolution could miss considerable small fires, especially at the sensitive agriculture–forest interface, which therefore should be targeted as a priority conservation area.

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Active Fire Dynamics in the Amazon: New Perspectives From High-Resolution Satellite Observations

Abstract

Bibliographical note

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UN SDGs

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