Cutting-edge machine-learning models have created one of the most detailed, high-resolution maps yet of aboveground carbon density in the Amazon Rainforest, revealing where the forest is most intact and what areas are most in need of conservation attention.

A combination of machine-learning models and satellite readings show that the Amazon Rainforest contains 56.8 billion metric tons of aboveground carbon, or the amount of carbon contained in plants on the surface of the Amazon. It’s one of the most precise estimates to date and amounts to more than one and a half times global emissions in 2023.

“I was just really mesmerized by the data,” Matt Finer, director and senior research specialist of Amazon Conservation’s Monitoring of the Andean Amazon Project (MAAP), told Mongabay. “You just put your glasses on and you can suddenly see. The carbon feature of the Amazon is suddenly clear.”

The map is the result of an MAAP analysis of data from the Forest Carbon Diligence program run by Earth-imaging outfit Planet, which measures tree cover, tree height and the carbon storage of trees. It also used high-resolution airborne lidar data (a technology that employs lasers to scan an area, much like radar), combined with a global carbon data set from NASA satellite readings.

The result was one of the most precise readings ever of forest carbon in the Amazon, showing which areas are the densest and providing clues to what conservation approaches are the most effective. According to the map, the highest carbon levels are located in the southwest Amazon — specifically southern Peru and western Brazil — and in the northeast Amazon, in countries like French Guiana and Suriname. Other areas appear to have significantly less carbon, including the tri-border region of Brazil, Guyana and Venezuela, as well as spots in northern Peru.

Of the nine Amazonian countries, Brazil has the highest amount of carbon, with 32.1 billion metric tons, more than half of the Amazon’s total aboveground carbon. Peru is second, with 8.3 billion metric tons, followed by Colombia, Venezuela and Bolivia and then Guyana, Ecuador and French Guiana.

Unlike other carbon readings of the Amazon, MAAP’s report concluded that, as a whole, the Amazon Rainforest is still acting as a carbon sink rather than a carbon emitter, a key to keeping global temperatures below 1.5° Celsius (2.7° Fahrenheit) and preventing the worst impacts of climate change. In total, the Amazon gained 64.7 million metric tons of aboveground carbon between 2013 and 2022.

As a country, Brazil is also a carbon sink — with a gain of 102.8 million metric tons — despite other MAAP studies from previous years finding otherwise.

“The finding from MAAP that the Amazon remains a net carbon sink is reason for cautious optimism, even while forest loss in the region has remained high over the past decade,” wrote Christopher Anderson, science lead for the forest ecosystems team at Planet.

“Making the transition from sink to source could mark a critical tipping point,” he also wrote, “where feedback loops between deforestation, drought and fire would lead to progressively slower rates of carbon sequestration and evapotranspiration, and eventually towards large-scale turnover in species communities.”

Some of these conclusions were visible, but not quite as obvious, in previous mappings of carbon in the Amazon, such as last year’s MAAP analysis of data from NASA’s Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation (GEDI), which used lasers on the International Space Station to map the topography of the region. But the lasers left gaps that these new readings were able to fill in.

GEDI measured megagrams of aboveground biomass per hectare at a 1-kilometer (0.6-mile) resolution, picking up 37 billion metric tons of carbon, whereas this new study from Planet measured aboveground carbon density at a 30-meter (100-foot) resolution, finding 56.8 billion metric tons — nearly 57% more carbon than GEDI found.

It allows for a more detailed view of trends in the Amazon, most notably what conservation approaches have been most successful. Aboveground carbon density appears to be highest in remote primary forests of protected areas, the MAAP report said, as well as in Indigenous territories. Others are in forestry concessions.

Together, Indigenous and protected areas contain about 61% of the densest carbon areas in the Amazon, approximately 16.9 million hectares (41.8 million acres).

These findings could help conservationists and policymakers choose more effective conservation strategies in the future, as well as where in the region to focus their efforts when trying to prevent the Amazon from becoming a carbon sink.

For example, a peak carbon area around the tri-border region of Brazil, Suriname and French Guiana is mostly covered by protected areas and Indigenous territory. But there are several “undesignated” lands that could be ideal candidates for protection status, ensuring that the area retains its carbon.

“With the Amazon approaching a tipping point, it’s not clear how much longer we can expect the benefits of these carbon sink dynamics to last, especially with total forested area shrinking over time,” Anderson said.

Banner image: The Brazilian Amazon Rainforest from above. Photo by Neil Palmer/CIAT/Flickr. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

See related from this reporter:

New datasets identify which crops deforest the Amazon, and where

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