Amazon Rainforest hits record carbon emissions from 2024 forest fires

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🗞️ Driving the news: The Amazon Rainforest emitted a record-breaking 791 million metric tons of CO₂ from forest fires in 2024, a sevenfold increase over the previous two years, according to a new study by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre
• For the first time on record, emissions from fires exceeded those from deforestation, with Brazil accounting for 61% and Bolivia for 32% of total fire-driven emissions

🔭 The context: The sharp rise in emissions coincides with one of the worst droughts in the region’s history, exacerbated by the El Niño phenomenon and long-term climate change
• Human-induced fire use — often tied to illegal land clearing — exploited the dry, flammable conditions
• Fires in 2024 affected at least 3.3 million hectares of forest (Brazil’s own figures suggest double that), accelerating forest degradation and triggering increased deforestation in 2025 after a temporary drop

🌍 Why it matters for the planet: These emissions — totaling 1.4 billion metric tons of CO₂ from fires and deforestation — surpassed Japan’s annual emissions, highlighting the Amazon’s shifting role from carbon sink to carbon source
• The data adds urgency to concerns about an approaching ecological tipping point, where forest degradation could trigger irreversible changes to global climate systems
• The forest's declining resilience to fire due to climate change and land-use pressure is a major global risk

⏭️ What's next: Environmental authorities and international partners face growing pressure to scale up enforcement, fire prevention, and reforestation measures ahead of the 2026 dry season
• Brazil’s Environment Ministry has acknowledged the growing fragility of primary forest cover and is expected to propose strengthened land governance and climate adaptation strategies
• The findings will likely influence COP29 climate talks, particularly on global forest finance and carbon market integrity

💬 One quote: "The tropical forest, which is naturally immune to large fires due to its humidity, is suffering a huge impact from climate change, reducing its resistance to fires and becoming more vulnerable." – João Paulo Capobianco, Executive Secretary, Brazil’s Environment Ministry

📈 One stat: In 2024, Amazon fires and deforestation emitted 1.416 billion metric tons of CO₂—more than Japan's total emissions in 2022

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