In 2018, a worn suspension hook on a transmission tower broke and dropped a high-voltage powerline onto combustible vegetation, sparking the Camp Fire, an inferno that razed the town of Paradise, California. One rusty hook ended up killing 85 people, destroying more than 18,000 structures, and causing an estimated $16.5 billion in damage. Large wildfires not only wreak havoc on communities; they also further unbalance the earth’s carbon cycle. Earlier this month, NASA reported that the 2023 summer fires in Canada released around 640 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere—roughly equivalent to the annual emissions of an industrialized nation.
Read the full article: Forbes.com