Several times this summer, smoke from wildfires has covered Vermont, obstructing the air and making it dangerous for those who are already at risk to be outside.
There have been numerous days in towns throughout Vermont where the air quality was unfit for sensitive groups, and data from the Environmental Protection Agency that Vermont Public examined indicates an increase in recent years.
Is this all truly new? We consulted a few scientists.
How has air quality in Vermont changed over the years?
Wildfires were widespread in what is now the northeastern United States and Canada before European settlers arrived.
In fact, fire is essential to the survival of Canada’s enormous tracts of taiga and boreal forests. Numerous tree species there have evolved to withstand fire, and periodic burns aid in their procreation.
Canadian Forest Service researcher Dan Thompson stated, “I think it’s important to remind the listener that this part of Canada’s forest, this sort of northern boreal forest, is very much capable of burning.”
Since fire is and has always been a natural component of those ecosystems, wildfires have historically caused the northeast to experience smokey days or weeks on occasion.
However, it wasn’t the main cause of air pollution in the area for a long time.
Days when it was dangerous to be outside due to ozone from industrial pollution were common in Vermont in the 1990s.
Ozone is rarely a problem since that the United States has regulated power facilities under the Clean Air Act.
These achievements are now being undermined by microscopic particles from wildfire smoke known as PM2.5.
In 1992, the EPA began gathering information on smoke from wildfires in Vermont.
Additionally, Vermont has experienced an increase in days with poor air quality due to smoke from wildfires in recent years.
Where is the smoke coming from, and what s causing the fires?
Vermont’s bad air quality had a particularly difficult year in 2023. If you consider the number of hectares of forest that burned, it was Canada’s worst wildfire season ever.
Then, smoky skies were mostly caused by wildfires in northern Quebec. The air quality in Montreal used to be the worst in the world.
Long-term drought facilitated the ignition and spread of such fires after lightning strikes, but human activity also contributed. Forest management and logging techniques increased the likelihood of fires and increased their intensity if they broke out.
On the other hand, smoke from fires burning hundreds of miles north of Winnipeg in the provinces of Manitoba and northern Saskatchewan has dominated Vermont’s summer.
More from NPR: Smoking “half a pack a day” is comparable to wildfire smoke. Here are some tips for self-defense.
According to Dan Thompson of the Canadian Forest Service, the trees are modest and are black spruce trees. Consider the scant, ragged vegetation found atop Vermont’s mountains, which is a low forest of balsam fir and spruce trees.
In contrast to 2023, these fires are raging in woods that are mainly uncontrolled in functionally enormous wildernesses, where there is little to no logging occurring due to the small size of the trees.
The majority of the towns are either mining settlements or Indigenous communities, and they can be reached by plane in the summer or by ice road in the winter.
“This year is a perfect example of how human-caused climate change is changing Canada’s wildfire season because there is very little forest management and human activity in these relatively untouched areas,” Thompson said.
Are we seeing more smoke in Vermont because of climate change?
This question has a simple answer: yes.
Northern latitudes are warming more quickly than most other regions of the world due to human-caused climate change. The closer you are to the arctic, the faster the rate of warming.
There has been a protracted drought and heat wave across northern and central Canada. This summer, temperatures have frequently reached the 90s in areas just outside the polar bear habitat.
Climate scientists can show that climate change is causing temperatures to rise, which can exacerbate an already-existing drought in forests.
When the air is extremely hot and dry, trees act almost like straws, sucking moisture out of the soil and plants, much like kindling or firewood curing in a woodshed, according to Justin Mankin, a climate scientist at Dartmouth College who has served on the US National Drought Task Force.
Similar to kindling, it indicates that if and when lightning hits, the forest is more prepared to fire and burn more intensely.
How much more severe is the drought as a result of the unusually high temperatures that are unquestionably caused by global warming? That drought, how much more persistent was it? How far down? Mankin inquired.
The duration between major flames in the taiga and boreal forest is getting shorter due to this warming trend, according to Dan Thompson of the Canadian Forest Service.
In central Canada, forests that used to burn every 50 years now burn at least ten times a decade. According to him, several of the woodlands that are burning this summer actually burned completely in 2015.
This does not provide species like balsam fir and jack pine adequate time to grow cones and rejuvenate in between fires.
The spread of fires is also being altered by climate change. Fewer seed trees are being left behind as more fires burn hotter and further for longer periods of time.
How did all of this get to Vermont? From central and western Canada, the jet stream transports smoke and weather to northern New England.
New England will likely see more smoke as a result of the west and central Canadian prairies seeing more regular wildfires.
Justin Mankin, a researcher at Dartmouth, predicted that poor air quality from wildfire smoke would be the most commonly felt effect of climate change [in the Northeast].
In many situations, scientists in Canada believe there is nothing more they can do to contain these large, distant fires, and the United States has no authority over land management in Canada.
According to Justin Mankin at Dartmouth, “we are in a situation where we are beginning to experience a walkback of those successes because of a pollutant that we cannot regulate.” A power plant cannot be turned off or scrubbed. Warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions is the main issue here. Therefore, mitigation is the lever to pull.
The second-largest emitter in the world is the United States.
Just how bad is smoke for your health and what can you do to stay safe?
PM2 is the main pollutant found in smoke from wildfires.Five little particles with the ability to deeply enter lung tissue.
In addition to wood smoke, it also contains volatiles from burning garbage and houses, as well as a variety of other substances.
Indigenous populations in Canada are disproportionately affected by wildfires and at risk from smoke.
Additional Information from NPR’s Lifekit: How to Guard Against Bad Air Quality
According to Jill Baumgartner, states and localities in the Northeast would be well advised to think about smoke solutions such as clean air shelters from a public health standpoint. She added that even brief exposure to smoke can result in long-term health issues for children, pregnant women, and those with chronic illnesses.
As more people in our densely populated area are exposed to PM2.5, even at the levels Vermont has experienced in recent summers, population-wide health effects including some types of cancer may begin to manifest more frequently.
Wearing a KN95, creating your own air filter, remaining inside, or reducing your activity levels when it’s smoke-filled can all help in the interim.
“Oh, it’s okay, you know, I’m not scared of the smoke, I can just power through,” Baumgartner said, referring to the relatively recent arrival of wildfire smoke to the East Coast. Furthermore, now is not the time to do it. It’s not like going for a run in the rain or anything similar. Inhaling that smoke can even negate the cardiovascular benefits of that exercise, and these toxins are extremely harmful to your health.
Additional information from Vermont Public: An overview of air quality and smoke from wildfires for Vermonters
