Amazon on fire

AMAZON ON FIRE

Since the beginning of the year, 44,000 fires have been recorded in the Amazon forest, disrupting its role in the water cycle and carbon stock regulation over the long term.

The Amazon is burning continuously, igniting trees, social networks and diplomatic relations. While fires devour part of the world's largest tropical forest every year, deforestation, aggravated by the arrival in power of far-right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, is damaging a fragile ecosystem. And threatens a jewel of biodiversity, which stores CO2 and regulates the climate.

According to the National Institute for Space Research (INPE), the country has recorded the highest number of fires (85,000 in eight months, including 44,000 in the Amazon) since 2010, the year in which the El Niño climate phenomenon caused a severe drought. By the end of July, nearly 58,000 km2 had gone up in smoke in Brazil, including 18,000 km2 in the Amazon rainforest, high figures for the current decade, but lower than the previous one.

Some of the fires in Brazil are repeated every year and have no negative impact on ecosystems, as they are savannah fires and not forest fires. Savannahs, known as cerrado in South America, are dependent on fire for their proper functioning, as it allows them to regenerate themselves. The problem is when fires affect dense rainforest.

Since the beginning of the year, 44,000 fires have been recorded in the Amazon forest, disrupting its role in the water cycle and carbon stock regulation over the long term.

The Amazon is burning continuously, igniting trees, social networks and diplomatic relations. While fires devour part of the world's largest tropical forest every year, deforestation, aggravated by the arrival in power of far-right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, is damaging a fragile ecosystem. And threatens a jewel of biodiversity, which stores CO2 and regulates the climate.

According to the National Institute for Space Research (INPE), the country has recorded the highest number of fires (85,000 in eight months, including 44,000 in the Amazon) since 2010, the year in which the El Niño climate phenomenon caused a severe drought. By the end of July, nearly 58,000 km2 had gone up in smoke in Brazil, including 18,000 km2 in the Amazon rainforest, high figures for the current decade, but lower than the previous one.

Some of the fires in Brazil are repeated every year and have no negative impact on ecosystems, as they are savannah fires and not forest fires. Savannahs, known as cerrado in South America, are dependent on fire for their proper functioning, as it allows them to regenerate themselves. The problem is when fires affect dense rainforest.

But well, all these fires wouldn't be that bad if there weren't those you can't even see: peat fires.Indeed, forest fires are only the tip of the iceberg. In the taiga, there are also peat fires, invisible, at a depth of one or two metres. Such fires can last for years or even decades and are impossible to treat. Scientists fear that they may thaw part of the permafrost, the permanently frozen ground one or two metres from the surface that covers half of Siberia. This would release huge amounts of carbon dioxide, and even better, it is 70 years ahead of the IPCC forecast, which did not expect such a thaw before 2090.

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