WORLD : Amazonian Forest in Dire Peril

WASHINGTON — Most of the Amazonian rain forest could disappear in 50 to 100 years if the current pace of destruction continues, and the devastation could be irreversible, a new study published today said.

“Our results show that if Amazon deforestation continues at the present rate, it will produce irreversible changes in climate that could make re-establishment of the tropical forests particularly difficult,” said Jagadish Shukla, a meteorologist at the University of Maryland-College Park.

An estimated 12% of the rain forest has already been destroyed and an additional 14,000 square miles is destroyed each year, the study said.

A scientific team including Shukla and Carlos Nobre, an engineer and meteorologist with the Brazilian Space Research Institute, conducted their one-year study using a newly developed mathematical model of the rain forest climate. The model predicted that when the forests are replaced with pasture, the Earth’s surface and the soil will grow warmer and the amount of rainfall will plummet in the region.