Forests are good at storing carbon, and boreal forests--the ones in colder places--especially so. Which means that large fires in boreal forests can release a great deal of carbon into the atmosphere, enough to blow past the still-hoped-for limits agreed to in the Paris Accords.
So protecting the forests from large fires could be a relatively cheap way to put the Earth on track to meet carbon dioxide emission targets. That is among the findings of a recent paper published by members of the Union of Concerned Scientists and other researchers.
Carly Phillips and Brendan Rogers are the first two names on the list of authors; they visit with highlights of the research.