Amazon Rainforest’s Carbon Sink Function on the Brink of Collapse

New research reveals the Amazon rainforest has reached the dangerous threshold of becoming a net carbon source rather than a sink. Satellite monitoring data published by New Scientist indicates that between 2013 and 2022, the amount of carbon released from deforestation and fires exceeded the amount absorbed by the rainforest. Severely degraded areas in the southeast have become stable net carbon emitters. Brazil’s planned trans-Amazonian highway could further accelerate deforestation, while illegal mining in the Kayapó indigenous territory of Pará state has already destroyed 18,000 hectares of forest—four times the devastation in the Yanomami region. Scientists warn that if annual deforestation exceeds 0.5%, the rainforest could transform from the “lungs of the Earth” into an accelerator of the climate crisis by 2030.