Arctic Wildfires at a Tipping Point

I have written on this subject before. Arctic amplification is a secondary effect of climate change, where global warming in the summer increases the temperature by more than twice as much in Polar Regions.  A major concern from this is that it accelerates melting of the polar ice caps.

Unfortunately, rising oceans are not the endpoints of the risk from arctic amplification. Another effect, with a strong positive feedback element, may even be worse in the long run. Two recent articles and papers in Science describe this effect. The following text is from a summary of the main paper.

Vast amounts of organic carbon are stored in Arctic soils. Much of this is in the form of peat, a layer of decomposing plant matter. Arctic wildfires release this carbon to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide (CO₂) and contribute to global warming. This creates a feedback loop in which accelerated Arctic warming dries peatland soils, which increases the likelihood of bigger, more frequent wildfires in the Arctic and releases more CO₂, which further contributes to warming. Although this feedback mechanism is qualitatively understood, there remain uncertainties about its details.