Not long ago we all saw those fires raging in Brazil's Amazon rainforest.
The Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais in 2019 reported 80,000 fires up until August,
while wildfires also blazed in the countries of Bolivia, Paraguay and Peru.
It was estimated that 906 thousand hectares of forest was lost due to these fires, which
is a massive 9,060 km2 or 3,500 square miles.
This has devastating effects on local indigenous communities, but does the other side of the
world suffer, too?
We don’t need to tell you that the Amazon rainforest covers a large area.
Most of it is located in the country of Brazil, around 60 percent of it, but it also covers
a fair bit of Peru and Colombia as well as smaller parts of Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia,
Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana.
There’s around 2,100,000 square miles (5,500,000 km2) of rainforest.
It’s the most biodiverse forest in the world and it’s said there are about 16,000 species
of trees.
If you were to count all the trees you might find there are something like 390 billion
of them.
No one has actually done this of course, and that’s a ballpark estimation.
Also living in this place are an estimated 40,000 plant species, 2.5 million insect species,
1,294 bird species, 427 mammal species, 428 amphibian species, and 378 reptile species.
It’s like nowhere else in the world, but it’s also getting smaller because of human
development.
Over the years humans have been clearing parts of the forest for development purposes, and
this is known as deforestation.
So much of it has gone that it can be seen from space.
Most of the deforestation happens so there are spaces of pasture for cattle, but space
has been cleared for soy farming, drilling for minerals, damming, land claims, logging,
and more.
Scientists are concerned about a tipping point, with some people saying that deforestation
could lead to accelerated global warming.
Before we get into the global impact we must first think about what deforestation means
for indigenous people that live in the forest.
Scientists sometimes talk about something called “Evapotranspiration”, which has
been described as “forest sweating.”
When the forest sweats it brings the temperature down, but with fewer trees there is less sweat
and so the place heats up.
If we consider current global warming and on top of that less forest sweating what we
have as a result is a much hotter place.
We say much, but a small rise in temperature is actually a big rise because of the negative
effects.
As one scientist wrote, “Increasing temperatures and drought are already shifting the plant
composition of the Amazon, and many trees will perish as conditions breach the limits
at which they can survive.”
The animal population is also reduced and so the result for local populations is a disruption
of their livelihoods.
There is the fear that the tipping point will come if temperatures rise as much as 3°C
to 4°C, which could create a savanna-like environment for parts of the forest.
This will destroy a lot of this biodiversity we have talked about and will have devastating
effects for anyone who lives in those areas.
But it won’t just affect local people, experts say.
The more of the Amazon forest that disappears the less carbon it soaks up and the less oxygen
is released into the atmosphere.
If all the trees and the plants were suddenly destroyed billions of tons of carbon would
be released and we would be looking at a global catastrophe they say.
If some almighty conflagration were to set this forest on fire that would happen, but
we must also think about what that smoke would do the people in the vicinity and farther
away.
Air pollution would be so bad it would be hard to breath and make it dangerous to be
outside.
When the fires were raging this year and everyone from celebs to leading news organizations
came out to say the lungs of the world were being destroyed, what followed were some other
reports debunking this.
Talking to Forbes, one scientist said there has been a problem but that problem has been
around a long time.
While the deforestation and fires is certainly a big issue, that scientist said there has
also been some amount of hysteria.
Forbes wrote, “Against the picture painted of an Amazon forest on the verge of disappearing,
a full 80% remains standing.
Half of the Amazon is protected against deforestation under federal law.”
Some people acknowledge that a more serious problem could arise if global warming results
in much bigger fires down the line, but right now most of the Amazon is intact and globally
we shouldn’t have any huge problems.
It’s a different matter of course if you live in or near to a place that has burned
to the ground.
Today we are trying to understand what might happen if there were these extreme fires down
the line, if the forest did burn like it has never burned before.
Well, in 2019 The Atlantic wrote this, “The Amazon Is Not Earth’s Lungs” and it underlines
that with “Humans could burn every living thing on the planet and still not dent its
oxygen supply.”
In fact, scientists tell us the Amazon absorbs as much oxygen as it produces so it effectively
produces zero oxygen.
This article claims that it would be a tragedy if more of the forest burned, with so much
biodiversity destroyed and communities ruined, but the world far from the Amazon would still
be ok in terms of having air to breathe.
One scientist interviewed wrote, “Even the most foolhardy destruction of world forests
could hardly dint our oxygen supply, though in other respects such short-sighted idiocy
is an unspeakable tragedy.”
Another scientist was asked what would happen if we burned all the trees on Earth.
He answered, “Virtually no change.
Generations of humans would live out their lives, breathing the air around them, probably
struggling to find food, but not worried about their next breath.”
Others have chimed in, saying we have millions of years’ worth of oxygen on this planet
and it isn’t going anywhere.
One scientist wrote, “Even if all organic matter on Earth were burned at once, less
than 1% of the world’s oxygen would be consumed.”
So, it seems the world will be able to breathe, but still deforestation impacts people in
a way that threatens their lives or livelihoods.
Pollution is a killer, and so we really don’t want any more smoke from burning fires.
We want to keep our diverse flora and fauna.
We need to protect our forests and we need to protect the communities that live in them,
but we should also be skeptical according to many scientists when we talk about the
world’s oxygen just running out.
Right now most scientists agree that more needs to be done to protect the Amazon rainforest,
and we might hope that what happened this year will mean changes for the good in the
near future.
Do you agree with everything we’ve said today?
Can you add anything?
Tell us in the comments.
Also, be sure to check out our other video This Is What Will Happen When The World Runs
Out Of Oil.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.