Portland State Magazine, Spring 2021

12 // PORTLAND STATE MAGAZINE THE CHANGING NORTHWEST research From extreme fire to vanishing ice, Portland State scientists are tracking the region’s transformation ASK A SKIER and they’ll tell you the seasons are getting shorter. Ask a hunter and they’ll tell you herds are being driven out by fre. Ask a fsher and they’ll tell you salmon runs are smaller. Climate change is transforming the Pacifc Northwest. “It’s helpful for us to be able to quantify what to expect so we can prepare for it,” says Kelly Gleason, an assistant professor of eco-hydro-climatology at Portland State University. “Te future is going to be very diferent than what we’re used to.” Gleason is one of many Portland State researchers working to understand exactly what’s happening to our climate so scientists can develop efective mitigation strategies. Her research focuses on the relationship between snowpack and wildfre. So far, the data points to an accelerating cycle in which each change feeds the next. “Snow is melting faster, which lengthens fre season. And forest fres lead to snowpack melting faster,” she says. “It’s a vicious cycle.” ANDY MCEVOY, a graduate student in environmental science and management, has been studying forest fres in the Clackamas Basin. In his simulations, wildfres like the ones that burned across more than a million acres of Oregon in a matter of days last summer are likely to become more common. In the Cascade Range of Oregon and Washington, the data points not only to larger average fres, but also to more extreme forest fres. “No matter which scenario we model, they all projected more days that are conducive to fre spread,” he says.Te simulations showed that the fre season increased from as little as eight days to as many as 32. Hotter days with lower relative humidity mean more opportunity for dry wood to ignite and for fre to spread and grow. In the least impacted scenario—with the coolest and wettest weather—the average area burned by wildfres increased by 50%. In the most extreme—the hottest and driest—it FOREST SERVICE U.S. In September 2020, the Archie Creek Fire increased by 540%. For the Clackamas (seen here) scorched 131,542 acres east of Basin region, that’s the diference between Roseburg. According to the Oregon Office of a burn the size of the John F. Kennedy Emergency Management, the historic 2020 International Airport and one the size of Oregon wildfires destroyed 4,021 homes. Manhattan. Between 2015 and 2019 all of Oregon’s wildfires combined burned 93 homes.