Congratulations, We Found Something Worse Than Fossil Fuel Emissions

Canada’s record-breaking wildfires have now surpassed fossil fuels in carbon emissions, signaling a dangerous new chapter in the fight against climate change

Despite working from home, I don’t have a room dedicated as my office space. Instead, I took some dead space in between our rooms and set up a working station. It may not seem ideal to most, but it comes with an amazing perk: I have a ginormous window by my side.

I did my entire PhD in a “middle of the building” department with no windows. Being surprised by unexpected weather when I headed home in the evening was a recurrent event, and my circadian rhythms were inexistent. So, you can understand how happy I am to have such amazing views of the neighborhood all day long.

However, the scenery hasn’t always been pretty. Last summer when Canada burned down, I could barely see my neighbors across the street. No outdoor activities for the kiddos, the air quality was just too dangerous. We live in the Washington DC area, quite far from Canada, so I knew this meant the fires were bad… real bad.

Being as passionate about climate change as I am, I started to wonder: How will these emissions affect our fight against climate change? Well, I’m not actively contributing to scientific research at the moment, but luckily, scientists at NASA have investigated and have answers for us.

A little bit of context here. In 2023, Canada faced one of the most intense wildfire seasons in its recorded history. Spanning from May to September, the fires scorched around 15 million hectares of forest, an area more than seven times the typical annual burn of previous decades. For you to make a comparison, this is the size of Tunisia, the states of Georgia, or Illinois for those living in North America.

The fires were devastating beyond anything Canada has ever seen. They displaced thousands of people and released a staggering amount of carbon into the atmosphere.

Off course, scientists wanted to investigate this phenomenon further. What can we expect if these events kept happening?

A new study published in Nature sought to quantify the carbon emissions from these unprecedented fires and what this could mean for our planet’s future climate. Unfortunately, it isn’t good news.

According to the study, the carbon emissions from these fires totaled 647 teragrams of carbon (TgC). That’s the equivalent to the annual fossil fuel emissions of large industrialized nations. In fact, only India, China, and the United States emit more carbon per year than was released by wildfire in those five months. To put it into perspective, the fire emissions alone were four times larger than Canada’s usual annual fossil fuel emissions. FOUR TIMES LARGER.

No wonder I couldn’t see beyond my neighbor across the street.

But why did this happen in the first place? Surprise, surprise: Climate.

The fires were fueled by some of the most extreme climate conditions seen in decades. The year 2023 was the warmest and driest year in Canada since at least 1980. “We found that the fire emissions were bigger than anything in the record for Canada,” said Brendan Byrne, the lead author of the study and a scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Canada’s forests experienced temperatures 2.6 degrees Celsius above average, while 86% of the forested areas had below-average precipitation. Not a great combo. The lack of rainfall and the unusually high temperatures created a tinderbox scenario, allowing the fires to grow rapidly across the country’s precious wilderness.

The researchers used advanced satellite technology, specifically the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI), to measure the carbon monoxide (CO) in the atmosphere during the fire season. This is the same satellite that has been documenting the impact of the Amazonian fires during the last few years.

This data was then used to estimate the total carbon emissions, including both carbon dioxide (CO2) and carbon monoxide. By tracking the atmospheric concentrations of CO, the scientists could backtrack and determine how much carbon must have been released during the fires.

But first, we need to clarify something here. While the immediate impacts of such large-scale emissions are significant, it’s essential to note a key distinction between carbon from wildfires and carbon from fossil fuels.

As forests regrow, some of the carbon released by the fires will eventually be reabsorbed by the ecosystem. In contrast, carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels remain in the atmosphere, contributing to long-term climate warming without a natural offset.

However, despite this potential for reabsorption, there are growing concerns about the future of Canada’s forests as a carbon sink. But why? Well, in the past, these forests have acted as a critical buffer against climate change, absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere.

The increasing frequency and intensity of wildfires threaten this ability. The 2023 fires alone burned around 4% of Canada’s total forested area. Considering that climate models predict that the temperatures experienced in 2023 will become the norm by the 2050s, fires of this scale are likely to become more common, further diminishing the forests’ capacity to absorb carbon.

These fires represent a significant challenge not just for Canada but for the global effort to combat climate change. Canada’s extensive forests have long been one of the planet’s critical carbon sinks, meaning they absorb more CO2 than they emit. However, these large-scale fires and ongoing climate change could turn these forests from a carbon sink into a carbon source, exacerbating the climate crisis. (Remember the Amazon Tipping Point?)

“What we found was that the fire emissions were bigger than anything in the record for Canada,” Byrne said. “We wanted to understand why.” The study points to the combination of heat and drought as the main drivers behind the scale of the fires, with 61% of the fire emissions occurring in the northwestern part of the country, where conditions were especially severe (see the animated GIF above).

Moving forward, the researchers highlight the need for improved fire management strategies and a more robust understanding of how climate change will impact wildfire activity in the future. Wildfires have always played an essential role in maintaining the health of forests, clearing undergrowth, and making room for new plant life.

However, with the increasing severity of fires, the natural balance may be tipping, threatening the long-term stability of these ecosystems. Remember, we don’t want to be burning at a faster pace than the forest is growing.

The 2023 fires remind us of the rapidly changing climate and the urgent need to adapt to these new realities. The need to accept the reality and take steady action towards mitigation and adaptation.

If large-scale fires become the norm — as is predicted by most climate models, and indeed the lived experience of the last few years — they could significantly impact global efforts to reduce atmospheric carbon and mitigate the effects of climate change.

In the end, while forests may eventually recover and reabsorb some of the carbon emitted by the fires, the increasing frequency of such events suggests a troubling future. Canadian forests, once a reliable ally in the fight against climate change, may find themselves overwhelmed by the very conditions they were once resilient against. The question now is whether we can act quickly enough to prevent the worst outcomes.

Indeed, climate change is already creating a world where kiddos can’t play outside as easily anymore. Besides, would you want them playing if you can’t even see them outside your window?