Climate change is making the Western United States drier, which can fuel wildfires like those affecting Los Angeles.

With higher temperatures come parched landscapes full of vegetation that can accelerate and exacerbate blazes.

“Climate change has a way in which it dries the landscape out faster, keeping the landscape able to ignite and carry fire and that provides less resistance for a fire to spread,” said John Abatzoglou, a climate scientist with the University of California, Merced.

Abatzoglou added that such “spread” can contribute not only to larger fires, but also to help them in “overcoming some of the barriers and encroaching upon communities.”

As Southern California burns, global warming is literally and figuratively heating up.

U.S. and European Union scientists announced Friday that 2024 was officially the

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