Amazon’s Global Warming Counterweight Threatened

Since the start of the 21^st century, major planetary ecosystems, like the Amazon rainforest and Antarctica have consistently deteriorated, but within only the past two years, these two major ecosystems have deteriorated much faster than ever before. This is happening at geological breakneck speed. Nothing is normal any longer. What’s going on?

The Amazon rainforest experienced a horrific drought event in 2024. Paradoxically, global warming is attacking its own most significant counterweight. A major study found over one third of the Amazon is struggling to recover from four supposedly “one-in-a-century” dry spells in less than 20 years. (Critical Slowing down of the Amazon Forest After Increased Drought Occurrence, PNAS – National Academy of Sciences)

The scientific literature for 2024 focused on some very big issues: (1) record global heat, above the IPCC-warning of 1.5°C above pre-industrial (2) Amazon rainforest rapid deterioration amidst the most brutal drought conditions ever, major rivers dried-up (3) alarming Antarctic conditions prompting an emergency meeting of 450 polar scientists: “Runaway ice loss causing rapid and catastrophic sea-level rise is possible within our lifetimes.” (Emergency Meeting Reveals the Alarming Extent of Antarctica’s Ice Loss, Earth.com, Nov. 24, 2024)

These events are interconnected determinate factors of a global climate system that’s turned unstable. This is not normal. It is erratic and volatile.

For starters, the Amazon rainforest is in terrible condition. Climate scientists would likely agree that loss of the Amazon will be “game over” for civilization in many respects. Based upon current data, they would also likely agree the rainforest is dying.

“A major question is whether a large-scale collapse of the Amazon forest system could actually happen within the twenty-first century…  The Amazon stores an amount of carbon equivalent to 15–20 years of global CO₂ emissions and has a net cooling effect from evapotranspiration that stabilizes the Earth’s climate^. (Critical Transitions in the Amazon Forest System, Nature, February 14, 2024)

In other words, the Amazon has the biggest job on the planet, stabilizing the climate system. It’s telling that, as the Amazon deteriorates, the climate system turns wackier with massive storms, heat, drought, and floods. No more once in 0ne-hundred-year events. They’re once every other year nowadays.

Evidence of serious Amazon deterioration is prevalent. The world’s leading Amazon authority Carlos Nobre (University of São Paulo) was recently interviewed, November 14, 2024: “Carbon Sink to Carbon Source?”

In 1975, 0.5% of the rainforest was deforested.

Today, 18% is deforested.

Today, 38% of the remaining forest is degraded to a vulnerable condition.

For the first time in recorded history extreme drought has become a regular feature of the rainforest, like clockwork every couple of years. This is not normal. According to NASA, the frequency eliminates natural recovery.

In some regions of the forest, the Amazon emits more carbon than it stores, similar to cars, planes, trains, and industry. This is one more first in climate history, a net carbon CO2 emitter directly into the atmosphere, joining human forces.

But it’s not only the Amazon that’s in deep trouble. Recently, scientists discovered impending Antarctic collapse in some regions, like West Antarctica, more advanced than anybody ever thought possible, necessitating an emergency meeting of 450 polar scientists in Australia only a few weeks ago.

These two major ecosystems have powerful impact on the overall world climate system and by all appearances are in early stages of coming apart at the seams, couched in mystery as to “when” and “how earth-shattering” it will be. Alas, “business as usual,” given enough time, and the world will sit up and take notice and declare an emergency. How to fix it? But when and what to do? And why wasn’t it addressed much sooner?

There are no answers to those questions. The Amazon rainforest, Antarctica, and climate change are not highly ranked in public polls, e.g., according to a Gallup Poll, Dec. 12, 2024, the top concerns include immigration, inflation, the economy, healthcare, and poor government leadership. Climate change didn’t make a showing. It’s of little surprise there is not an effective effort to quantify the risks and recommend what should be done, assuming anything is actually possible, probably not, re anthropogenic destruction of life-supporting ecosystems. But scientists know all about it. Just ask them. Oh yeah, almost forgot, the incoming administration doesn’t believe in science.

In today’s world of politics, especially right-wing, science is ignored or denigrated, as it interferes with cooked up conspiracy stuff that motivates ignorant people to vote for whatever flashes on a TV screen. This results in the greatest dumbing-down of society ever witnessed in human history within a strong science legacy traced back to Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia 3000 to 1200 BCE. Only brief intervals of modern human history have witnessed political denigration of science like today, other than occasional bouts with religion, e.g., centuries ago, Earth as the center of the universe mayhem, ahem! Could we be going back to that? Maybe.

Meanwhile, threatening, the Amazon is at the most vulnerable of its remarkable history of stability. A key study was posted in the prestigious publication Nature, finding that 75% of the Amazon rainforest is losing “resilience,” or the ability to recover from droughts and fires. (Pronounced Loss of Amazon Rainforest Resilience Since 2000s, Nature).

That chilling fact is the product of global warming and forest-clearing/burning. This is not normal. Quite the opposite, as the mighty rainforest has 55 million years under its belt; it’s a strong survivor, until now.

Four years ago, Princeton held a special Amazon Conference: A World Without the Amazon? Stephen Pacala, the Frederick D. Petrie Professor in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University: “We face four major environmental crises in the world now: climate, food, water, and biodiversity. The Amazon is at the center of all of them.”

“The Amazon is the biggest in a belt of forests that wraps the planet’s midsection. It is a jungle so hot and humid it makes its own rain. Its web of rivers is the largest in the world and contains about one-sixth of the world’s fresh water.” (The Amazon is the Planet’s Counterweight to Global Warming, Inside Climate News).

“The trees in the Amazon release 20 billion tonnes of water into the atmosphere per day, playing a critical role in global and regional carbon and water cycles.” (WWF) Where else could 20B tonnes of water per day come from for the global hydrology system? Answer: Nowhere.

Alas, “Up to half of the Amazon rainforest could transform into grassland or weakened ecosystems in the coming decades, a new study found (A Collapse of the Amazon Could Be C0ming Faster Than Thought, New York Times, Feb. 14, 2024).

According to the World Wildlife Fund: “The largest jungle on our planet, the Amazon, is in danger of drying out. If we lose just 5% more to deforestation, it may never be the same again.” (The Amazon is Dying, Our Planet, WWF, Netflix).

That film is five years old. The 5% is nearly gone.

A world climate system not regulated by Antarctica, crumbling, and the Amazon rainforest, which is already wobbly, will turn dangerously erratic in a reign of climate terrorism that takes lives and livelihoods while destroying megacities from coast-to-coast.

Solutions: Stop deforestation and fires that are 95% human-caused and stop CO2 emissions. But nobody wants to hear this.

Robert Hunziker

Los Angeles

The post Amazon’s Global Warming Counterweight Threatened appeared first on CounterPunch.org.