Last year was filled with extreme weather fueled by climate change. California was overrun by mudslides, and there were dangerous heat waves, droughts, and hurricanes. More than four in ten Americans live in a county that was affected by climate disasters in 2021, and more than 80 percent experienced at least one day of unusually high temperatures, reported The Washington Post. At least 656 people died due to the disasters, according to news reports and government records. The financial cost of all these disasters was more than $104 billion, not including the wildfires, extreme heat, and drought in the West.

There were fewer climate disasters reported in individual counties last year as compared to previous years, but eight statewide emergencies related to climate disasters — including hurricanes, landslides, fires, floods, and severe storms — were declared by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the most since 1998.

In the wake of the Marshall fire, the most destructive in Colorado’s history, Louisville, Colorado, Mayor Ashley Stolzmann said, “When I lay awake the first night, not able to sleep from the fire, when I was evacuated from my house, the first thing I thought of is: I need everyone to reduce their carbon emissions,” The Washington Post reported.

Scientists say that wildfires have intensified and their seasons have gotten longer due to rising temperatures. In recent decades, the proportion of “high severity” fires, which destroy much of a forest’s vegetation, has increased significantly in many types of forests, according to a 2012 study published in Forest Ecology. Research reported by NASA’s Earth Observatory has found that fire seasons have gotten longer across a quarter of Earth’s vegetated surface, and portions of the western United States now have wildfire seasons that last more than a month longer than they did 35 years ago.

While climate disasters mounted, the pollution caused mostly by the burning of fossil fuels hit near-record highs last year. One of the big questions is whether the United States, the country responsible for the production of more greenhouse gases than any other country in history, will do all it can to curb global warming and try and prevent these disasters before the planet warms to an irreversible degree.

Read the full article about climate disasters by Cristen Hemingway Jaynes at Eco-Watch.