Wildfires Made Canada One of World's Top Carbon Emitters in 2023, Study Finds - Last year, the top three emitters of heat-trapping carbon pollution were China, the United States and India.

Last year, the top three emitters of heat-trapping carbon pollution were China, the United States and India. Just missing the podium, in fourth place: that summer’s Canadian wildfires, which released more carbon into the atmosphere than every other country in the world, according to a new study published Wednesday. Wildfire emissions over five months, from May to September of 2023, were more than four times larger than Canada’s annual fossil fuel emissions from all other sources, the researchers calculated.

- By Kate Allen

Last year, the top three emitters of heat-trapping carbon pollution were China, the United States and India.

Just missing the podium, in fourth place: that summer’s Canadian wildfires, which released more carbon into the atmosphere than every other country in the world, according to a new study published Wednesday. Wildfire emissions over five months, from May to September of 2023, were more than four times larger than Canada’s annual fossil fuel emissions from all other sources, the researchers calculated.

The study, published in the journal Nature, adds another shocking statistic to a wildfire season that has racked up many.

But it also adds to a growing and critically important area of research on the health of Canada’s forests, which currently siphon off a big chunk of the carbon emissions humans release and prevent the world from warming even faster.

“When we emit carbon, we get this big discount of carbon taken up by the forest. And in a lot of ways we kind of rely on that discount,” said Brendan Byrne, lead author of the new study.

“For that reason, it’s very important to understand how these forests and natural ecosystems are absorbing and releasing carbon.”

Byrne is a scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. But he was born in Alberta and raised in British Columbia, so when Canada’s forests started burning out of control last summer, he was paying attention.

“Being Canadian, I was watching the fires probably more than I would have otherwise. And that was really what got me interested in this study,” Byrne said.