![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/News-Wire_Sun_.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nSo, if not climate change, then what? Keeley points to two main culprits: power and people.<\/p>\n
First, human ignitions. More than 95 percent of fires in Southern California are started by people. Past policies have been able to decrease incidents caused by cigarettes and campfires substantially, but cases due to arson and power line failures have persisted. In fact, the No. 1 cause of area burned in Southern California is power line failures, according to the California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force\u2019s Southern California regional burn profile<\/a>.<\/p>\n Second, population growth. For decades, California has added hundreds of thousands of residents annually, leading to urbanization in fire-prone areas. \u201cWhen you put more people on the landscape \u2026 they\u2019re being pushed out further and further into watersheds of very dangerous fuels,\u201d Keeley said. Additionally, the development of new areas extends the electric grid and multiplies the risk of ignition.\u00a0<\/p>\n The danger of overstating the impacts of climate change is that it lets us off the hook. \u201cIf you say the fire is due to climate change, they just figure, well, that\u2019s fate, and they can\u2019t do anything,\u201d Keeley explained. But fires here are not fate\u2014they are overwhelmingly the result of human choices, which are tractable issues that can be resolved.<\/p>\n This doesn\u2019t mean climate change isn\u2019t real, or that it doesn\u2019t influence fire risk. On the north side of the country, for example, climate explains about 40 percent of year-to-year fire variation, according to Keeley. But even in those forests, the majority stem from human management decisions, such as the suppression of natural burns that allows fuel to accumulate. Whereas in Southern California\u2019s chaparral, fires are a constant, with or without climate change.\u00a0<\/p>\n So what can be done? Starting with policy, significant strides have been made to reduce the risk of power line failures. In 2012, San Diego Gas & Electric was sued by the city for causing two wildfires after an equipment malfunction. The company now monitors winds in real time and cuts power once wind speeds exceed a certain threshold. According to Keeley, they haven\u2019t seen another major line-caused fire since adopting these measures. This strategy has proved its effectiveness in reducing the number of human ignitions, and it\u2019s a matter of expanding it statewide.\u00a0<\/p>\n On the individual level, \u201chome hardening,\u201d combining vegetation management and the utilization of fire-resistant materials, can significantly reduce fire damage. This relatively inexpensive investment can save many dollars in the long run, though it\u2019s worth noting that household protection is only effective against regular-scale fires and wouldn\u2019t have been effective against the extreme LA fires.\u00a0<\/p>\n Taken together, these solutions remind us that California\u2019s fire future will be shaped less by distant climate forces but by decisions we make today. If we want to protect our homes, we need to stop thinking about climate change on its own and start thinking, \u201cIt\u2019s climate change and \u2026\u201d because in the end, fire here isn\u2019t fate or luck, it\u2019s the sum of our choices.<\/p>\n High School senior Lawrence Zhang at Cate School in Carpinteria wrote this commentary as part of a personal journalism project researching wildfires in Southern California by interviewing fire experts and survivors. Send a letter for publication to letters@santamariasun.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n