Despite recent precipitation, New Jersey remains under a drought warning. Rain and snowfall statewide have generally helped water supply conditions, but the accumulations are not enough. While fire restrictions have been lifted statewide, we still need more precipitation.
Since July, New Jersey has experienced well below-average rainfall, which has contributed to diminished streamflow, reservoir, and groundwater levels. October was the driest month on record in the state, based on observations dating back to 1895, with no rainfall recorded over the entire month! September was the third driest on record.
Studies show New Jersey’s dry spells are getting longer and hotter. With time, drought in this state we’re in will intensify – another side effect of climate change. Extreme drought translates to less water for animals and plants, and government-mandated water restrictions – and uncontrolled wildfires that affect air quality and threaten ecosystems.
A major factor causing climate change is the massive release of carbon into the atmosphere that was previously bound up in fossil fuels for millennia. Drought fueled by changes in the climate is resulting in an increase in wildfires that is releasing significant amounts of carbon that was stored in forests and soils at the earth’s surface, which creates a positive feedback loop that worsens the problem.
“There is no question in my mind that the land is drying up,” says Bob Williams, forester at Pine Creek Forestry, LLC, a New-Jersey based forest consulting firm. “People can talk about weather patterns but I know what I am looking at when I see the landscape.”
Williams witnessed an incident during a recent wildfire in the state’s Glassboro Wildlife Management Area that he says was a direct result of the drought. Fire came through a forest growing in organic peat soil, which is material that formed over the course of thousands of years from old cedar and maple swamps. The fire burned through a thick surface layer of pine needles and reached the peat soil, where it smoldered underneath the surface. Root systems that held up healthy trees disintegrated, and the trees toppled over throughout the forest.
“I have never seen that in my life,” says Williams. “The real question is: will the trees ever come back?”
Historically, fire has played a necessary role in managing the health and vitality of forests. Certain trees, insects, plants, and other species have adapted to forest fires. Fire helps regenerate the land, and assists in the natural birth-death-rebirth cycle of forests. Humans have been using fire to manage land for millennia, and New Jersey Conservation Foundation uses prescribed burns to promote natural fire regimes in Pine Barrens preserves. But the more intense, frequent wildfires occurring in drier conditions (like Williams witnessed) pose greater threats to humans and the environment, including New Jersey’s precious forests.
For well over a century, the New Jersey Forest Fire Service (NJFFS) has been the agency responsible for protecting life and property, as well as the state’s natural resources, from wildfire. Fire Warden Trevor Raynor of NJFFS says he is grateful for the recent precipitation, but fires are still burning.
In 2024, New Jersey had 1,380 wildfires – burning more than 10,000 acres – with 12 “major” wildfires (defined as wildfires that have burned over 100 acres). The number of acres burned is not more than last year, according to Raynor, “but the frequency of the fires is higher this year.” Over 90% of the wildfires in New Jersey are accidentally caused by humans. “Come this spring, if we do not get that winter precipitation, we might be back to the conditions we had this fall,” says Raynor.
In September, New Jersey released “A Strategy To Advance Carbon Sequestration On New Jersey’s Natural and Working Lands,” as a follow up to the state’s Global Warming Response Act report from 2020. The Global Warming Response Act serves as New Jersey’s climate action plan, and calls for cutting about 75% of greenhouse gas emissions between today and 2050 to begin to slow the devastating impacts of climate change.
Most of the targets and recommended policy changes laid out in the recent strategy document need to be widely implemented by government agencies, organizations, and industry in order to meet the goals. All sectors must accept and adopt fundamental changes in how energy is consumed, how waste is produced and disposed of, and how natural and working lands are managed. And there is no time to waste!
The state has taken a leadership role on the clean energy side of the equation under Gov. Phil Murphy, joining a handful of other states addressing the substantial contributions that energy production makes to greenhouse gas emissions. But there is much more work we need to do to harness the power of natural lands to capture carbon from the atmosphere, like adopting regenerative agricultural practices and protecting and restoring forests and marshlands.
Economy-wide transformation is needed but the responsibility to provide funding, infrastructure, and support for these changes lies with the government. To avert some of the catastrophic drought and fires looming on the horizon, New Jersey – like the rest of the world – needs to pay more attention to natural lands as a key strategy for sequestering carbon and countering climate change. The state’s new report has some good strategies and we cannot afford any delay in implementing them – and we need many more states to join the effort. The future hangs in the balance.
To learn more, please visit https://dep.nj.gov/ghg/about/carbon-sequestration/. To view current New Jersey fire danger levels and conditions, and learn about fire safety, visit https://www.nj.gov/dep/parksandforests/fire/. To view current drought status and conditions, visit https://dep.nj.gov/drought/.
For information about preserving New Jersey’s land and natural resources, visit the New Jersey Conservation Foundation website at www.njconservation.org or contact me at info@njconservation.org.
