Via Euronews: Greek wildfires have unleashed the same CO2 emissions in July as over 222,000 cars in a year
A megaton of carbon has been emitted by the Greek wildfires so far this month, scientists estimate.
Greek wildfires have unleashed the same CO2 emissions in July as over 222,000 cars in a year
Via Euronews: Greek wildfires have unleashed the same CO2 emissions in July as over 222,000 cars in a year https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/07/27/greek-wildfires-have-unleashed-the-same-co2-emissions-in-july-as-over-222000-cars-in-a-yeaJ
A megaton of carbon has been emitted by the Greek wildfires so far this month, scientists estimate.
The wildfires that have been raging in Greece since 17 July are behind the country’s highest emissions for this time period in 21 years, according to the EU’s Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS).
The island of Rhodes and areas west of Athens in Attica have been the worst hit by the blazes. Climate change is largely to blame for creating the conditions in which the inferno has taken hold.
“The current ongoing heatwave affecting Greece and the Mediterranean has increased the wildfire risk which is reflected in the high observed intensity of the wildfires around the Mediterranean,” says CAMS senior scientist Mark Parrington.
According to the US Environmental Protection Agency’s calculator, a megaton (aka one million tonnes) of emissions is equivalent to the pollution from 222,500 cars driven in a year, 500,000 kg of coal burned, or 2.3 million barrels of oil consumed.
The megaton of carbon emissions released between 1 July and 25 July is almost double Greece’s July 2007 spike.
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How have the Greek wildfires affected air quality?
“With several more weeks left in the summer we will continue to closely monitor the fire emissions and potential air quality impacts across the region,” adds Parrington.
It’s not just residents in Greece that need to watch out for the air pollution.
CAMS forecasts of particulate matter and other pollutants associated with wildfire emissions have shown smoke transported southward across the Mediterranean. This has been confirmed by visible imagery of the smoke plumes from different satellites.
This shows how these wildfires will affect the air quality downwind of the fires both locally and around the wider Mediterranean region, say Copernicus experts.
Keeping track of the smoke transport is key to taking the appropriate measures to minimise any potential impacts, they add.
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What is the environmental impact of the Greek wildfires?
As well as the vast amount of emissions unleashed by high-intensity blazes, the loss of biodiversity in these fragile ecosystems is an increasing concern for many environmentalists.
Earlier this week Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis described the country as being “at war”. “The climate crisis is already here, it will manifest itself everywhere in the Mediterranean with greater disasters,” he told Parliament.
Today, the PM added that "The climate crisis may be a reality, but it cannot be an excuse.”
"Our country ought to take more steps [...] to be ready to mitigate, as much as possible, the effects of a reality that we are already starting to feel, and that could have dramatic effects on many different aspects of our economic and social life," he said.