The Amazon rainforest, the world’s largest and most biodiverse, is facing an existential crisis as record-breaking wildfires fueled by drought and deforestation ravage the region. According to top climate scientist Carlos Nobre, the Amazon is in grave danger of crossing the ‘point of no return’, potentially transitioning into a dry savannah within the next 30-50 years. This sobering report highlights the urgent need for concerted global action to save one of Earth’s most critical natural wonders.
From Optimism to Alarm
Only last year, Carlos Nobre was guarding against alarmism. A preeminent Brazilian climate scientist, he had fought to balance realism and optimism about the Amazon. For the first time, he observed, every one of the regional powerhouses was engaged in coming up with answers to serve the forest. But things are quite different now: due to drought, the fires burning in the Amazon are more widespread than they have been in years.
This Climate Home News piece, quoting Nobre, notes the world is at risk of losing its ‘Amazon. In Brazil, the largest country in South America, a bone record wave of fires is wreaking havoc, fueled by extreme drought due to climate change and large-scale deforestation. The country of Brazil suffered the worst drought in history and winds fueled wildfires this month that are among the largest fires recorded there in more than 10 years, leaving up to 80% of the nation’s population covered by smoke.
Explosive Surge in Severe Weather
The violent weather events that have picked up pace in certain corners of the globe, Nobre says, are not a gradual process. By that time, there was already a disturbing acceleration and record-breaking rise in ‘heat waves, heavy rains, droughts, forest fires’ around the world.
Not just for its own sake, but because if no efforts are made to entirely end the process of deforestation and if global warming maintains at its pace, Nobre worries that the Amazon may reach ‘the point of no return’ by 2050 – meaning at least half of the forested area is likely going to be gone. Should warming peak at 2.5°C by 2050, then we could expect several tipping points to be breached and also the possible loss of the Amazon jungle in its entirety.
Calls for Immediate Action
Nobre calls for a range of measures to mitigate climate warming and prevent the destruction of the Amazon. Measures include faster swaps to renewable energies and the planting of millions of trees in cities as ‘urban sponges’ that can reduce temperatures by up to 4.5°C/8F and improve humidity.
If no action is taken, the Amazon could become a dry savannah grassland within the next 30-50 years, he said. Its loss would be a cataclysm, not just for biodiversity and the Amazon ecosystem, but it simply is more than bad climate havoc. The Amazon is on the brink of extracting this enormous volume of CO2 to the atmosphere which further raises risk and challenges for its conservation, which will be lost if we do not act immediately — the world risks ‘losing the Amazon’
