Boreal Forests Around the Globe Are Going Up in Smoke: Is this Era the Pyrocene?
In two previous videos, I have described the science behind the ongoing record-setting Canadian wildfires and how the smoke travelled southeast to choke out tens of millions of people on the US East coast, including those in New York City.
In this video, I delve into more details on the ongoing burning of our planets boreal forests, not just in Canada but across Russia and China. The ongoing heat wave in northern Russia’s Siberian region and northern China stretches all the way north into the Arctic. Already, this record setting off-the-charts heat wave has caused major fires (not well reported) in northern Asia. Essentially, the satellite data is showing that this boreal forest incineration is already setting records this spring, well before the usual fire season even begins.
Unfortunately, the more remote wildfires that start in July or August and are not near towns or infrastructure are left to burn out themselves in the fall as the summer ends. Since many of these fires are starting now in May or June, they burn for much longer than before over much larger areas.
Extremely bad for our planet.
I also discuss how the PM2.5 air particles, which are killing between 7 and 10 million people globally every year (various papers report a number within this range) are shortening the lifespan of people in the most polluted cities in the world (like New Delhi, India) by up to a decade. Bangladesh, the most polluted country in the world as far as air quality goes, has average citizens living lives 6.9 years shorter due to the air pollution alone. The global average reduction of lifespan from PM2.5 air pollution alone is nearly 2 years (one year, 8 months).
Back in 2014, a study from Berkeley found that exposure to 22 microgram per cubic meter of PM2.5 particles was equivalent in degrading human health to smoking one cigarette.
So a day in Ottawa last week, with a count of 511 microgram per cubic meter, was like every man, woman, and child smoking almost a pack of cigarettes (assuming 24 per pack?; I don’t smoke).
A city in Russian has reached 1400 microgram per cubic meter, equivalent health wise to smoking 3 packs of cigarettes (cancer sticks, coffin nails) per day. I’ve seen numbers on the World Air Quality Index (real-time) even double that, but not sure how accurate the detectors are?)
Please donate at http://PaulBeckwith.net to support my research and videos as I join the dots on abrupt climate system mayhem.
