Climate Change to Cause More Lightning

In a new study published in Science, researchers contend that as a result of global warming, the number of lightning strikes will increase by 50 percent in the U.S. by the end of the century. According to the report, with every degree Celsius that the Earth warms, the number of lightning strikes will increase by 12 percent. An increase would be especially threatening to areas prone to wildfires—in just one 24-hour period in Northern California in August, lightning started 34 wildfires. On average in the U.S., there are about 25 million lightning strikes a year. The scientists behind the study were David Romps and Jacob Seeley of UC Berkeley and David Vollaro and John Molinari of State University of New York at Albany.