© NASA Earth Observatory / Joshua Stevens
Satellite images show more than 100 long-lived wildfires with huge plumes of swirling black smoke covering most of the Arctic Circle including parts of Russia, Siberia, Greenland and Alaska.
The wildfires have now reached "unprecedented levels," according to Mark Parrington of the EU's Copernicus Emergency Management Service, who said the smoke vortex is covering a "mind boggling" two million square kilometers.
Wildfires are burning across 11 regions in Russia with the largest covering Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk and Buryatia. Likely caused by lightning strikes, as of July 22 they have burned 320 square miles (829 square kilometers), 150 square miles (388 square km) and 41 square miles (106 square km) in the regions, respectively, according to NASA's Earth Observatory.
The fires have emitted 50 megatons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere over the last six weeks, "which is equivalent to Sweden's total annual emissions", according to the European atmosphere monitoring service, CAMS. This staggering amount is more than was released by Arctic fires in the same month between 2010 and 2018 put together.
"It is unusual to see fires of this scale and duration at such high latitudes in June," Parrington said. "But temperatures in the Arctic have been increasing at a much faster rate than the global average, and warmer conditions encourage fires to grow and persist once they have been ignited."
Comment: It's not that warm in the Arctic.
No, the significant factor behind them is likely to be the 'accelerant' provided by increased outgassings of methane and CO2, in part due to increased seismic activity. Lightning, which is also on the rise, provides the spark. Then the fires themselves produce lots more CO2.
Like, vastly more than humans can produce.
The smoke and other particulates the fires produce are joined by increased dust from increased meteors and increased volcanic eruptions, which all then jointly contribute to the increased dust-load in the atmosphere, which changes its electric charge rebalancing mechanisms, producing more intense storms and precipitation in the form of record rainfall, hail, lightning strikes, etc.
Notice that man-made activity is nowhere to be seen in this naturally intensifying feedback loop...
We're just along for the ride.