Part 1: The Anime Revenge Story of the Amazon and its Canadian Counter-Part

Canada's Amazon Forest: A 3 Part Series

Wilderness is truly something to marvel at. It is wondrous, frightening, tantalizing, yet paralyzing, every piece offering a new thrilling experience. To much dismay these undisturbed environments are dwindling rapidly. One of the most prominent of these dwindling environments is the Amazon. It is no secret that the Amazon has been shrinking for decades due to anthropogenic disturbance (Deforestation due to logging, agriculture, mining, etc.) . These activities have caused a large shift in the Amazon, and Covey et al (2021) has shown that due to this, the Amazon has begun to contribute positive radiative forcing rather than negative radiative forcing. Meaning essentially that it is contributing to the warming of the earth more than the cooling. 

The once notoriously beneficial Amazon forest has begun its anime revenge story and is actively contributing to climate change, now how in the world has this happened?

Well in short, it's because of us humans, shocking! The Amazon used to act as a net positive for fighting climate change due to its ability to store greenhouse gasses (GHGs) in its vegetation and soils (The environmental services of the Amazon go far beyond this, but for times sake this is the main service it provided to help prevent climate change). Now, the vegetation and soil in the Amazon stores a large amount of GHGs, but they also emit GHGs. This is due to the natural cycles that occur in every ecosystem, but the carbon that is stored in these ecosystems outweighs the GHG emissions naturally. In the last couple decades the Amazon carbon sink ability has rapidly declined due to anthropogenic disturbances previously mentioned. The consequences of this deforestation has gone beyond just a loss of carbon sink ability and has resulted in a rapid increase in GHG emissions from the Amazon. 

Fire is commonly used as a deforestation method in the Amazon and as this fire rages through the Amazon forest it burns all organic material, releasing carbon and methane in large amounts. This fire and loss of vegetation contributes to the overall warming of the Amazon and the soil in it. As this soil warms it releases more GHGs (Methane and Nitrous oxide) and lowers the carbon storing ability of the soil. After these fires have cleared a large enough area in the dense forest these pieces of now open land are often converted to agriculture land. Which further increases the GHG’s emissions since agriculture unless done with regenerative techniques typically degrades soils, lessening its carbon sink ability whilst increasing its GHG output due to the use of fertilizers, over cropping, and cattle. This dynamic of increasing GHG emission potential while lessening carbon sink potential has created the situation we face today, a situation where the Amazon is actively contributing to climate change annually. 

The Amazon deforestation process is inherently negative for obvious reasons, such as loss of biodiversity, carbon sequestration, increased GHG emissions, and on and on and on. As capitalism continuously fuels the need to consume and grow we will continue to see the loss of ecological wonders like the Amazon. This does not mean that the Amazon will never again create negative radiative forcing, but as the Amazon approaches a potential deforestation tipping point, hope for positive change rapidly diminishes.  But as we attempt to preserve what is left of these wonders, we must also be preemptive in our attempts to prevent this in other areas, especially areas that are relatively intact. 

Things bring me to the Amazon of Canada. Now when people think of ecological wonders in Canada many minds would go to places like  the ancient rainforests on the west coast or one of Canada's extensive provincial parks (Jasper, Algonquin Park, so on) but perhaps the most ecological significant and intact of these is the Hudson Bay Lowlands. Now don’t get me wrong, the Ancient Rainforests are extremely valuable areas. They provide biodiversity, cultural significance, and carbon sequestration, but over 90% have already been lost. Whereas the Hudson Bay Lowlands are almost entirely in tack (99% approximately). Comparing the Ancient Rainforests to the Hudson Bay lowlands for many is perhaps a reach, but give me a moment here to explain myself. 

The Hudson Bay Lowlands are one of Canada’s greatest treasures. This expansive area of wetland and Boreal forest covers over 320,000 square kilometers and stretches across three provinces. Though this area is in two of the most populous provinces in Canada, it remains one of the least explored areas in Canada. The reason for this area remaining unexplored lies in its grueling terrain. The Hudson Bay Lowlands consists of a mess of difficult terrain, with vast swamps, rocky creeks and rivers, and trees that are reminiscent of a Tim Burton movie. Muskeg also blankets the terrain preventing any traveler from knowing what lies beneath. Muskeg is referred to as the “quick sand of the North'' and for good reason. Muskeg occurs when the peat begins to form above the water table, resulting in a seemingly traversable landscape.

(Photo of Hudson Bay Lowlands)

Allowing for any unsuspecting traveler to suddenly plunge into the frigid muddy water. On top of the dangerous terrain there are also dense swarms of bloodsucking insects that will stop at nothing to feast on your flesh. So, needless to say the Hudson Bay Lowlands are not a pleasant place to inhabit. This description may not immediately appear to be that of a national treasure, but I assure you like muskeg, the Hudson Bay Lowlands have fooled many. 

Swampy, buggy, and cold are not characteristics many find desirable, but the Hudson Bay Lowlands do not need desirability to be valuable. The  value of this area starts in the vast wetlands that the Hudson Bay Lowlands possess. With over 320,000 square kilometers of wetland, the Hudson Bay Lowlands can be described best as an environmentalist's dreamscape. 

Wetlands in northern Ontario are areas in which species at risk such as caribou, wolverine, lake sturgeon and even some polar bears seek refuge for their diminished populations. These wetlands overall have an extremely high level of biodiversity, which is just one of many environmental services they provide. Some of the other services wetlands provide include acting as a filter, storage area, water retention device and nutrient provider for the surrounding area. The wetlands in the Hudson Bay Lowlands can do these things at a high rate due to the incredible size and quality of them. But what truly makes the Hudson Bay Lowlands so valuable is its peat. 

Peat (What muskeg is made of) is valuable because it stores a large amount of carbon. Now peat is produced in nearly every wetland to some extent. Peat is created in wetlands when organic matter is being created faster than it is being decomposed. This occurs due to anaerobic conditions that occur in wetlands from the high water table. The anaerobic conditions reduce the rates of decomposition because the bacteria requires oxygen to break down said organic matter. As these conditions persist for extended periods of time the peat will continue to build up, as long as suitable conditions for organism growth persist. This process occurs in many wetlands and is in no way exclusive to the Hudson Bay Lowlands, but what makes the Hudson Bay Lowlands peat so special is the sheer quantity of it.

Peat is produced very slowly, so slowly that over a 15-25 year period only 1 inch of peat will be gained across a wetland. Now when this is produced in a wetland the size of the Hudson Bay Lowlands, over a long period of time, the gains become significant. So significant in fact, that this peat has helped make the Hudson Bay Lowlands one of the world’s largest carbon stocks at 32 petagrams. What is 32 petagrams you may ask, oh only 32 billion gigatonnes, yes billion. Compared to the Amazon’s approximately 123 billion gigatonnes this does not seem like much, but the Hudson Bay Lowlands is 50 times smaller than the Amazon. So some quick back of the hand math states that well the Hudson Bay Lowlands holds way more carbon per square kilometer than the Amazon. Globally peatlands hold approximately 600 petagrams of carbon which means the Hudson Bay Lowlands hold 5.3% of the world's carbon stored in peatlands. Subsequently peatlands hold 44% of the global carbon stored in soils, which holds 75% of the world's carbon stored on land, all of this to say that the Hudson Bay Lowlands store a lot of carbon. 

Unlike the Amazon,, the Hudson Bay Lowlands are nearly entirely intact. If we were to begin losing the Hudson Bay Lowlands then the environmental impact would be equivalent to the loss of the Amazon or any other ecological wonder in the world. In part 2 I will reveal how destruction of this ecological wonderland is imminent and could happen rapidly if we as Canadian’s do not wield whatever collective power we have left to stop it. I’ll give you a hint, the person who wants to destroy it has the name of a car company and his brother loves to smoke crack.

Reference

Covey, K., Soper, F., Pangala, S., Bernardino, A., Pagliaro, Z., Basso, L., Cassol, H., Fearnside, P., Navarrete, D., Novoa, S., Sawakuchi, H., Lovejoy, T., Marengo, J., Peres, C. A., Baillie, J., Bernasconi, P., Camargo, J., Freitas, C., Hoffman, B., Nardoto, G. B., Nobre, I., Mayorga, J., Mesquita, R., Pavan, S., Pinto, F., Rocha, F., de Assis Mello, R., Thuault, A., Bahl, A. A., Elmore, A. (2021). Carbon and Beyond: The Biogeochemistry of Climate in a Rapidly Changing Amazon. Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, 4, 2624-893X.