GENEVA — Arctic wildfires, some the size of 100,000 soccer pitches, emitted as much carbon dioxide (CO2) last month as the country of Sweden does in a whole year, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Friday.
“Since the start of June we’ve seen unprecedented wildfires in the Arctic region,” WMO spokeswoman Clare Nullis told a regular U.N. briefing in Geneva.
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“In June alone these wildfires emitted 50 megatonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere, this is the equivalent of Sweden’s annual total CO2 emissions. This is more than was released by Arctic fires in the same month between 2010 and 2018 combined.”
Wildfires are common in the northern hemisphere between May and October, but this year the fires have been at an unusual latitude and intensity, she said.
Most have been in the U.S. state of Alaska and the Russian region of Siberia, but one fire in Alberta, in the Canadian Arctic, was estimated to be bigger than 300,000 soccer pitches, or about the size of Luxembourg.