(ANSA) - NEW YORK, OCTOBER 19 - The catastrophic fires that hit California in 2020 have shattered nearly 20 years of progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
According to a new study, the fires in just one year have brought twice the emissions into the atmosphere than the reductions of those same gases since 2003. "Climate change is creating favorable conditions for ever larger fires, which are adding to the greenhouse gases that cause the climate change, "explained lead author of the research, Michael Jerrett, a professor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences at the University of California.
The fires of 2020 - showed the study published in the journal Environmental Pollution - released about 127 million tons of carbon dioxide into the air, compared to the 65 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions that California was able to reduce between 2003 and 2019. For the experts, however,
the problem of fires, particularly serious on the West Coast of the USA, is not limited to California and neighboring Oregon and the state of Washington, but has been a growing issue throughout the West for years.
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