Daniel Nepstad first set fire to the Amazon rainforest in 1985.
He was a young researcher at the time, studying how tropical forests remained so lush, even during the dry season. “I became obsessed with the incredible ability of these forests to endure drought,” he said.
After years of experiments, including numerous attempts to intentionally light the Amazon aflame, he arrived at a surprising conclusion: “Forests are pretty hard to burn down.”
Much has changed since then.
As climate change has pushed global temperatures to record levels, the Amazon has become increasingly combustible, creating years of rolling environmental crisis.
Persistent heat makes it harder for vegetation to retain moisture, which in turn makes it easier for forests to burn. On top of that, the vast majority of fires in the Amazon are set by humans, particularly by farmers clearing land for agriculture. Fire begets fire.
Last year, a
record amount of tropical primary forests burned around the globe, according to the World Economic Forum, five times as much as the prior year’s level of forest loss. In the Amazon, fires consumed an area larger than California.
Now Mr. Nepstad is returning to the Amazon to try to stop fires in a region that scientists have identified as a critical bulwark against global warming.
“Fire is the biggest threat to the Amazon, but it’s also a problem that’s possible to solve,” Mr. Nepstad said. “This is the biggest climate solution that could happen over the next few years.”
Working through his own nonprofit organization, the Earth Innovation Institute, along with a coalition of other groups, local business leaders and international research groups, Mr. Nepstad is trying to encourage small shifts in behavior that might help stop fires before they begin.
The changes he is asking farmers to make can be modest: planting different crops, letting forests return and pooling resources to afford machinery that can clear land instead of resorting to intentional burns. Yet in the aggregate, he believes these modifications can have a major effect.
