Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

EXTREME HEAT

Deforestation intensifies hot days

Nature Climate Change volume 8, pages 366–368 (2018)Cite this article

Subjects

Deforestation often increases land-surface and near-surface temperatures, but climate models struggle to simulate this effect. Research now shows that deforestation has increased the severity of extreme heat in temperate regions of North America and Europe. This points to opportunities to mitigate extreme heat.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Schematic of the impacts of deforestation on surface and near-surface temperature extremes.

References

  1. Luber, G. & McGeehin, M. Am. J. Prev. Med. 35, 429–435 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Lejeune, Q., Davin, E. L., Gudmundsson, L., Winckler, J. & Seneviratne, S. I. Nat. Clim. Change https://doi.org/s41558-018-0131-z (2018).

  3. Zaitchik, B. F., Macalady, A. K., Bonneau, L. R. & Smith, R. B. Int. J. Climatol. 26, 743–769 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Taylor, K. E., Stouffer, R. J. & Meehl, G. A. Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc 93, 485–498 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Alkama, R. & Cescatti, A. Science 351, 600–604 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Betts, R. A., Falloon, P. D., Glkdewijk, K. K. & Ramankutty, N. Agric. For. Meteorol 142, 216–233 (2007).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Bonan, G. B. Science 320, 1444–1449 (2008).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Teuling, A. J. et al. Nat. Geosci. 3, 722–727 (2010).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Paasonen, P. et al. Nat. Geosci. 6, 438–442 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Juang, J.-Y. et al. Glob. Change Biol 13, 887–896 (2007).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Burakowski, E. et al. Agric. For. Meteorol 249, 367–376 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Joo, E., Zeri, M., Hussain, M. Z., DeLucia, E. H. & Bernacchi, C. J. GCB Bioenergy 9, 1306–1319 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank A. Trowbridge, T. Gerken and the students of LRES 465 and 591 at Montana State University for valuable comments, and the US National Science Foundation for research support under grants DEB-1552976 and OIA-1632810.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Land Resources and Environmental Sciences, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT, USA

    Paul C. Stoy

Authors
  1. Paul C. Stoy
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Paul C. Stoy.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The author declares no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Stoy, P.C. Deforestation intensifies hot days. Nature Clim Change 8, 366–368 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0153-6

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0153-6

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing