Canada’s 2023 Wildfires Pushed Air Pollution to Decade-Level Highs
Canada’s record-breaking 2023 wildfire season led to a spike in air pollution in the country and in the US, erasing recent progress in cleaning up the air, according to new analysis.
The wildfires, which burned 42 million acres of Canadian forest , contributed to air-pollution levels not seen since 1998 in Canada and not seen since 2011 in the US, said researchers at the University of Chicago, which carried out the analysis for its Air Quality Life Index, a measure of how air pollution affects life expectancy.
More than half of Canadians breathed air that exceeded the country’s national clean air standards, an increase from less than 5% in the previous five years. And this year ranks as the second worst on record for wildfires in Canada, behind only 2023. Fires also are worsening air quality in the US and Europe.
Globally, air pollution from fine particulates released by sources including vehicles, power plants and industry increased slightly in 2023. There’s growing evidence that fossil fuels are reversing progress in improving air quality by increasing the likelihood and severity of wildfires , as well as contributing to air pollution when they’re initially burned, the researchers said. Air pollution can be acutely dangerous to people with respiratory conditions such as asthma, as well as raising the likelihood of developing life-threatening conditions like lung cancer and heart disease.
“We’re now stuck living with air pollution concentrations that are the dangerous ghost of the fossil fuels burned since the Industrial Revolution,” said Michael Greenstone , an economics professor at the University of Chicago and co-creator of the AQLI, in a statement. “Even countries that have earnestly spent decades cleaning up their air can’t escape these ghosts and the shorter and sicker lives that they deliver."