From Wildfire Risk to Resilience The Investment Case for Action 2026

As previously referenced, hotter, drier conditions tend to make fires burn larger and more intensely, releasing more CO2 as vegetation (and sometimes soil carbon) burns. For example, wildfire-related CO2 emissions in South America were approximately twice as high in 2024 as in 2014 (Figure 5). This aligns with elevated risks across parts of Brazil and other South American regions, where agricultural expansion and land- use practices contribute to fire occurrence.31 Meanwhile, Asia’s fire-related CO2 emissions were around 50% lower in 2024 than in 2014 (Figure 5). Normalizing emissions by area burned reveals a different pattern. In 2024, North America exhibited the highest CO2 emissions per hectare burned (approximately 0.06), followed by Europe (approximately 0.04), indicating more carbon- intensive fires relative to burned area. Beyond CO2, wildfire smoke contains fine particulate matter (PM2.5), which is a key public health threat.32 Wildfires also emit short-lived climate pollutants such as methane (CH4) and black carbon33,34 that contribute to near-term warming and have a warming potential many times greater than CO2.35 Figure 6 shows that population and asset exposure only partially overlap: people are most exposed in South and East Asia (notably India and China), as well as in parts of Africa, while assets are most exposed in the United States and also elevated in Russia and parts of South America. India and China stand out in both population and physical asset exposure to wildfires. Considering the regional analysis of severity ratings, area burned and emissions in conjunction with regional populations and assets that are most exposed, wildfires truly stand out as a global challenge with local nuances, requiring cross-sector collaboration.FIGURE 5 01234 Africa Asia Australia & Oceania Europe North America South AmericaEmissions, gigatonnes (Gt) Region 2014 20243.0 2.3 1.0 0.5 0.50.6 0.6 0.60.71.5 0.40.9CO2 fire emissions by region (2014 vs. 2024) Source: European Commission, Joint Research Centre. (n.d.). GWIS — Seasonal trend statistics. https://gwis.jrc.ec.europa.eu/apps/gwis.statistics/seasonaltrend.