For 1st time, fires are biggest threat to forests’ climate-fighting superpower

Forests play a major role pulling planet-warming carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. As the world heats up, some forests are becoming emitters in their own right.

In 2023 and 2024 the world’s forests absorbed only a quarter of the carbon dioxide they did in the beginning of the 21st century, according to data from the World Resources Institute’s Global Forest Watch.

Those back-to-back years of record-breaking wildfires hampered forests’ ability to tuck away billions of tons of carbon dioxide, curbing some of the global warming caused by emissions from burning fossil fuels.

Keep reading on The New York Times.