Carbon monoxide, one of the most poisonous gases released into the atmosphere from forest fires, has been detected well outside the territories of Russia and Canada, RIA Novosti reports.
NASA’s Aqua satellite, equipped with an atmospheric infrared sounder (AIRS), has noted a change in the concentrations carbon monoxide at an altitude of 5.5 kilometers (3.4 miles).
Scientists working with the AIRS said earlier that carbon monoxide concentration over European Russia alone, where thousands of hectares of wildfires are raging, increases by some 700,000 tons every day.
Pollutants from Russia and Canada have now formed a ring around the planet and are moving north.
The main concern is what impact the smoke would have on the Arctic, in terms of black carbon and other particles in the smoke settling on the sea ice and hastening the thaw, Reuters reports.
So-called brown clouds – a haze of pollution from cars or coal-fired power plants, forest fires and wood and other materials burned for cooking and heating – been blamed for dusting Himalayan glaciers with black soot that absorbs more heat than reflective snow and ice and so speeds a thaw.
As BarentsObserver reported, new models show the Arctic summer ice cap may nearly vanish in the summer much sooner that the year 2030, as earlier forecasted. The total Arctic area covered by thicker, older multi-year ice that has survived one or more summers shrank by 42 percent in course of the last four years. In recent years, the amount of ice replaced in the winter has not been sufficient to offset summer ice losses.
