Open AccessDefining a fire year for reporting and analysis of global interannual fire variability
Author(s) -
Boschetti Luigi,
Roy David P.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
journal of geophysical research: biogeosciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.67
H-Index - 298
eISSN - 2156-2202
pISSN - 0148-0227
DOI - 10.1029/2008jg000686
Subject(s) - environmental science , climatology , global change , scale (ratio) , meteorology , geography , climate change , geology , cartography , oceanography
The interannual variability of fire activity has been studied without an explicit investigation of a suitable starting month for yearly calculations. Sensitivity analysis of 37 months of global MODIS active fire detections indicates that a 1‐month change in the start of the fire year definition can lead, in the worst case, to a difference of over 6% and over 45% in global and subcontinental scale annual fire totals, respectively. Optimal starting months for analyses of global and subcontinental fire interannual variability are described. The research indicates that a fire year starting in March provides an optimal definition for annual global fire activity.