Study area in Pará State, Brazil

For decades, the Amazon rainforest has quietly absorbed vast quantities of human-generated carbon dioxide, helping to slow the pace of climate change. Recent evidence, however, suggests that this vital natural buffer may be weakening – though uncertainties remain. To help close this critical knowledge gap, European and Brazilian researchers have gathered deep in the Amazon to carry out an ambitious European Space Agency-funded Carbon Amazon Rainforest Activity field campaign.

European and Brazilian scientists – led by King’s College London and the UK’s National Centre for Earth Observation – have concentrated their efforts on a 100 km by 100 km area in western Pará State, Brazil. It is feared that this zone, which includes undisturbed forest, farmland and degraded land, is already tipping from a carbon sink to a carbon source, making it an ideal testbed for understanding the impacts of deforestation, degradation and fire on the Amazon’s ability to store and retain carbon.

Read full story: ESA investigates high-stakes Amazon tipping point