
Canada’s forests cover a vast area (almost 362 million hectares), accounting for about 8.5% of the global forested area. They are a huge store of carbon. Wildfires are a normal feature of this environment, but they are becoming more frequent, burning for longer and across larger areas. The summer of 2023 was the warmest and driest for decades and saw record-breaking wildfires in Canada’s boreal forests. Fires burned across the provinces of British Colombia, Alberta, Ontario, Nova Scotia, the Northwest territories and Quebec. Air pollution from the burning was blown into the USA affecting air quality in several major cities, including New York and Chicago.
A study of the 2023 Canadian wildfires published in the journal Nature estimated the magnitude of carbon emissions from May to September to be 647 teragrams of carbon (TgC), with an estimated range of 570–727 TgC. A teragram is equivalent to 1 megatonne or one million metric tons. The estimate of carbon loss includes carbon dioxide (CO2 ) and carbon monoxide (CO). The amount of carbon (CO2 plus CO) emitted from the forest fires was estimated using a range of data sources, including satellite data to map the burnt area.
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