A recent study from The National Academy of Sciences provided some very provocative insight into the rate at which our planet is speeding toward a point of no return in the effort to slow down its ever-increasing warming trend.  This new research has provided understanding of a leading meteorological variable controlling how much land burns in the western United States during a given fire season.
According to the study’s author Rong Fu, a climate researcher at UCLA, this variable is known as the vapor pressure deficit, which indicates how much moisture the atmosphere has pulled out of soil and plants, leaving the landscape to burn more easily. The warmer the weather, the more moisture is drawn from the earth, leaving behind a drier planet that becomes quite ready to go up in flames at the slightest provocation.
That leads us to contemplate what we can do about this propensity for our beautiful California to be ravaged by worsening wildfires that are devastating our environment, and costing billions of dollars and many lives to try to control.
This is a signal, a dire warning, that each of us must do as much as we are able to slow down the warming of our planet. We can do that through our personal actions, behavior and purchases, and by our support of government officials to enact proper laws and regulations that will further slow and reverse the warming that is currently progressing at full speed ahead.
The onus is upon us. Support businesses that support the planet, write to your congressional representatives, and ask them to help, write letters to newspapers, and wherever else that might have some influence.   
Let’s cool down the planet together, one and all! It’s time to take action. This is something that every single one of us can do.
Sally Louise White
Valencia
