To what extent will our future on Earth be shaped by fire? As the world gets hotter, the risk of more and bigger fires increases.
2010 was the hottest year on record, with global temperatures 0.53 degree Celsius above the 1961-1990 average. This year is not as hot so far. But serious drought has still gripped parts of the Americas and Africa.
Blair Trewin, an Australian climatologist, says that warm extremes are increasingly outnumbering cold extremes as the influence of the background warming trend strengthens.