Projected fire weather intensification across the Mediterranean: implications for management and restoration

Abstract Background The unique climate and biodiversity of the Mediterranean biome, combined with land use changes and socio-economic pressure, make it particularly vulnerable to longer fire seasons and extreme fire events. Understanding the extent to which exposure to future fire risk will be impacted by spatiotemporal shifts in so-called fire weather conditions driven by anthropogenic climate change is critical for long-term land management. Results This study presents a new set of robust projections for future changes in fire weather across the Mediterranean biome. Fire Weather Index (FWI) projections are generated from bias-corrected and downscaled input fields from the ACCESS-CM2 Earth System Model, selected for its high performance in simulating fire weather indicators across the region, and analyzed across areas of forest land and grassland under future climates associated with different levels of global warming. Results indicate significant increases in FWI seasonal average and annual maxima, in addition to fire season length, with the most pronounced changes occurring in the northern part of the study region. For the Mediterranean biome in general, fire seasons may begin more than a month earlier and extend in total by several weeks before the end of the twenty-first century. The proportion of land affected by fire weather categorized as very high or extreme is projected to rise substantially, notably in areas of forest land and mixed forest-grassland. Conclusions These findings underscore the need for adaptive fire and land management strategies that consider future fire weather conditions. Restoration efforts must consider the changed fire regimes, emphasizing fuel management, landscape diversification, and careful species selection. The study highlights the importance of regional cooperation and policy alignment, particularly under international initiatives such as the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. By providing robust, targeted projections, this work supports informed decision-making for wildfire risk management and ecosystem resilience across the Mediterranean biome.