The Future of Amazonia in Brazil. Marcílio de Freitas
Brazilian government’s political inability to propose forms of public-private partnership to exploit Amazonia’s natural wealth, maintaining the forest preserved in a sustainable way, has sacrificed several generations of Brazilians. Financing Amazonia’s economic and social development requires high investments, about US$1 trillion during ten consecutive years, in strategic Amazonian projects. The origin and application of these financial resources constitute a political action that needs to be executed, with public support, in the face of possible opposition from the hegemonic political interests of Brazil’s south and southeast regions, mainly.
The Amazonian rainforest basin presents itself as a “water world.” Its social and economic processes, its history and myths, geography, productive arrangements, and culture are driven by the cycles of nature permeated by the cycles of water and energy. Animal and plant life in Amazonia is inseparable from the cycles of nature. The meteorological sciences, agroecology, naval engineering, tropical medicine, anthropology, sociology of science, pharmacology, tropical technologies with emphasis on fish farming, information and communication technology, food technologies, ecological mining, design, and ecotourism, among others, are areas of science and technology essential to its sustainable development. Through research, ←7 | 8→innovation, and development programs; the integration and sustainable socioeconomic use of the Pan-Amazonian water basin is urgently needed. This is another Amazonian challenge.
The Amazonian region is crossed by the Amazonas River, which drains more than 7 million km2 of land and has an average annual outflow of approximately 176,000 m3/sec (176 million L/s). This makes it the world’s largest river by volume of water, approximately four times the volume of the Congo River in Africa (second largest) and ten times the volume of the Mississippi River. In the dry season, the flows of Amazonas River into the sea at about 100,000 m3/sec and at more than 300,000 m3/sec in the flooding season (Sioli, 1991). The Amazonas River is also the longest and widest on the planet. It is about 6,992 km long and 8–10 km wide in the periods of low water and up to 50 km wide, in flat regions, in the flooding season. It can be up to 100 meters deep.
Based on the RADAM (Radar Project of Amazonia) inventory and other reference sources, Junk (1993) estimated that 20–25% of Amazonia’s territory is periodically flooded. The high rainfall and the relief of the region favor this phenomenon, which covers about 1 million km2 of its biomes. Junk’s studies (1989) show that it is possible to measure the impacts of this phenomenon on the structures and processes that control the distribution of plants and animals, the primary and secondary production, and the nutrient cycles, among other important factors for the stability of these wetland forests.
The term “wetland forests” is used by Junk to refer to all types of forest subject to irregular, seasonal, or long-term flooding. Since Pre-Columbian times, this vast region has been inhabited by thousands of riverside residents who practice family farming and have livestock, causing only minor environmental impacts, and extract from nature only the products needed for their survival and trade with local organizations. Nowadays, this picture is in the process of major change due to the heavy pressure exerted by large logging companies, farmers, cattle ranchers, and large-scale fishing. These flooded forests play an important role in controlling primary production, carbon stock, and various biogeochemical cycles in the region, which is home to more than 1,000 species of trees (Junk and Piedade, 2010). Clearly, they, too, have connections with the control of climate change exerted by Amazonia. Its conservation and sustainable management and development is a challenge for Brazil.
Recent geological evidence also indicates the existence of an underground river about 6,900 km long, under the Amazonas River, at a depth of 4,000 meters. This underground river has a flow of 3 million liters (3,000 m3/s). The two water courses flow in the same direction-from west to east-but possess different physical behaviors (Pimentel, 2013). Several international geological studies seek to understand the characteristics of this complex river basin.
←8 | 9→
The Amazonian basin has low demographic density and one of highest rainfall indices on the planet, with an average of 2,200 mm per year (1 mm of rainfall corresponds to 1 liter of water per square meter). This represents an annual total volume of water of 12 × 1012 m3 (12 quadrillion liters), resulting in the world’s largest rainforest (Salati et al., 1983). The region has more than 1,000 rivers forming the hydrological network necessary for its ecological and social integration.
Evapotranspiration is an important phenomenon for the thermodynamic stability of plants. Through this process, the leaves of each tree in Amazonia release about 300 to 1,000 liters of water per day into the atmosphere. This immense amount of steam rises to the atmosphere’s upper layers forming the so-called flying rivers, which have a strong impact on regional and continental atmospheric processes. Researchers (Pinedo-Vasquez et al., 2013; Nobre, 2014) state that “In Amazonia, there are 5.5 million square kilometers occupied by native forests, with approximately 400 billion trees of the most varied sizes.” “We did the count, which was also independently verified, and emerged the incredible number of 20 billion tons (or 20 trillion liters) of water that are produced every day by the trees in the Amazonian basin.”
Therefore, there are the “flying rivers” in the Amazonian atmosphere, a complex hydrographical basin on its solid surface, and large hydrological reservoirs in its subsoil, not yet properly dimensioned. Understanding nature’s engineering operation here presents a great challenge for future generations. The connections between these natural water courses and the energy transport processes in Amazonia involve several worldwide ongoing interdisciplinary research programs.
The energy moves the splendor of animal and plant life in the Amazonian basin. The intensity of solar energy in this region is 400 calories per square centimeter per second. One calorie is the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree Celsius. It is estimated that 80–90% of this energy is used in the forest evapotranspiration process and 10–20% for air heating (sensible heat). There are days in which the temperature increases by up to 30 degrees for heights 10 km above the ground. In the forest on dry land, the steam originates from transpiration (70%) and from rain’s evaporation intercepted by the forest canopy (30%). The Amazonia and Congo basins and the area around Borneo are typically tropical, important to earth’s ecological stability and efficient in the absorption of solar energy and its redistribution via atmosphere (Crutzen and Andrae, 1990). Recent studies project that the humidity conversion process (via rain) in Amazonia’s atmosphere liberates heat equivalent to approximately 400 million megawatts. This energy is essential to Amazonia’s maintenance and to the thermodynamic stability of global atmospheric processes. These surveys are ongoing.
←9 | 10→
Amazonia’s energy and waters are the physical “fuels” of its biological and cultural diversity. Interventions in its environments by Amazonian traditional populations have increased its biological diversity over time. After the arrival of man in this region thousands of years ago, three factors have emerged and contributed to the multiplication of its heterogeneity. First, the hunting or selective fishing of large animals, birds, and fish; second, fire, which has resulted in the opening of small clearings; and the introduction of exotic species such as dogs, oxen, cultivated plants, and the domestication of native species (Brown Júnior and Freitas, 2002). The habits, relationships, and movements of its fauna and flora in its biomes as well as its physical interactions with external environments also amplified its biological diversity. Finally, the continuous renewal of its cycles of nature and the circulation of its peoples in its natural gardens also contributed to