Why some of the US has the most polluted air in the world right now

Why some of the US has the most polluted air in the world right now Canada’s smoke blanketing the US is just the latest example of intensifying wildfires. Rachel DuRose Vox

...Three ingredients — fuel in the form of vegetation, ignition via human causes or lightning, and hot, dry, windy weather — create the perfect conditions for extreme fire events like this, said Michael Flannigan, the research chair for predictive services, emergency management, and fire science at Thompson Rivers University in Canada. ...

All three of these conditions are becoming more common due to climate change. Our atmosphere acts like a sponge, absorbing water from our ecosystems, said Hurteau, who studies climate change mitigation and adaptation in forest systems. The size of our atmospheric “sponge” depends on the temperature: the hotter the climate, the bigger the sponge.

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