Research linking soot in Antarctic ice exclusively with early Māori fires was flawed – there were other sources elsewhere
- Written by: Rewi Newnham, Professor in Physical Geography, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
Shutterstock/jet 67When a recent study implicated forest fires set by early Māori in a hemisphere-wide rise in emissions, it ignited controversy.
The incriminating evidence comes from Antarctic ice cores containing so-called refracted black carbon – essentially far-flung soot derived from wildfires in the southern mid-latitudes.
The...