Not gonna lie I had the impression that Amazon was gonna get wiped out in a matter of weeks considering the amount of attention this story has been getting.
All the rainforest will disappear around 2040-2060 based on current projections. Not that I blame the developing world for growing palm trees or soybean that feeds the cattle or gets into products for the developed world.
To be fair, the article leaves out the size of the areas affected by the wildfires; however, it does proffer a guesstimation in the potential damage as a byproduct of the fires:
>The fires have been releasing a large amount of carbon dioxide, the equivalent of 228 megatonnes so far this year, according to Cams, the highest since 2010.
In units the Americans would be familiar with, that would be roughly 461,608,800,000 pounds of carbon dioxide. (1 tonne = ~2024.6 pounds, according to Wikipedia[0]).
For a few weeks there was almost zero news coverage. But the fires gained a lot of traction on the 20th of August [1]. The number of fires has increased year over year by 84% [2]. Given that the amazon produces 20% of Earth's oxygen that's quite a concern. I think the global outcry is warranted (any less may not have achieved a result). It's a good first step that Bolsonaro has deployed the Army for a month to fight the fires, time will tell if this is an authentic effort or one simply to quell the angry Internet mob. If we don't take a stand where profit > environment on a global scale are we not complicit in the destruction?
Hail Globalization!