We have been warned and warned about climate change along with our consumption and greedy consumerism of the planets limited resources. With overpopulation and homicidal leaders (yes, they have known for decades that this extinction event was accelerating) and yet, they have kicked this can of worms down the road for decades, and we are going to pay a horrific price for it.
The Amazon is known as the lungs of the Earth because it has the capability of “absorbing about 25% of the earth’s total carbon dioxide emission. It behaves similarly to a pair of human lungs, absorbing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and releasing oxygen”.
But no more. Phys.org shared a new study from the Sao Paulo Research Foundation:
Deforestation of the Amazon is about to reach a threshold beyond which the region's tropical rainforest may undergo irreversible changes that transform the landscape into degraded savanna with sparse, shrubby plant cover and low biodiversity. This warning derives from an editorial published in the journal Science Advances co-authored by Thomas Lovejoy, a professor at George Mason University in the United States, and Carlos Nobre, chair of Brazil's National Institute of Science & Technology (INCT) for Climate Change.
Cattle shelter from the sun under a tree in Mato Grosso. Cattle grazing accounts for around 70% of deforestation in the Amazon. According to Mongabay, most of the cattle ranches have low productivity, with much of the driving force behind this to establish land claims. 1"The Amazon system is close to a tipping point," Lovejoy said. According to the authors, since the 1970s, when studies conducted by Professor Eneas Salati demonstrated that the Amazon generates approximately half of its own rainfall, the question has been raised of how much deforestation would be required to degrade the region's hydrological cycle to the point at which it would be unable to support rainforest ecosystems. The first models developed to answer this question showed that the tipping point would be reached if approximately 40 percent of the region were deforested. In this case, central, southern and eastern Amazonia would experience diminished rainfall and a lengthier dry season. Moreover, the vegetation in the southern and eastern parts of the region would become similar to savanna.
A Ka'apor Indian warrior chases a logger who tried to escape after he was captured during a jungle expedition to find and expel loggers from the Alto Turiacu Indian territory. -— Reuters photographer Lunae Parracho recently went on a search and destroy mission in the Amazon with Brazil's Ka'apor Indians. Frustrated by the government's lack of action to keep illegal loggers out of the Alto Turiacu Indian territory, local warriors from several tribes have taken it upon themselves to find logging camps, destroy equipment, and drive out the unwelcome intruders. Parracho documented the scene as Ka'apor warriors captured a number of men in the forest, burned their trucks, destroyed their logs, then sent their captives down the road—freed, but without shoes or pants, their hands still bound. The Ka'apor Indians and four other tribes—the legal inhabitants and caretakers of the territory—have also set up monitoring camps in areas that are being illegally exploited. The Atlantic 1In recent decades, new factors in addition to deforestation have affected the hydrological cycle. These factors include climate change and indiscriminate use of fire by agriculturists during the dry season to eliminate felled trees and clear areas for crops or pasture. The combination of these three factors indicates a shift to non-forest ecosystems in the eastern, southern and central portions of the Amazon region at between 20 percent and 25 percent deforestation, according to the authors.