Wildfire Energy Census: The Global Annual Energy Release from Biomass Burning, Its Mean and Peak Power, and Its Place in the Planetary Energy Budget

Fire is usually counted in hectares burned or in tonnes of carbon emitted. It is rarely counted in the units in which it physically acts: joules and watts. This paper converts the two most recent generations of the Global Fire Emissions Database into an energy census. Taking fire carbon emissions of 2.2 Pg C/yr (GFED4s) and 3.4 Pg C/yr (GFED5), a carbon mass fraction of dry biomass of 0.47, and an effective heat of combustion of 18 MJ per kilogram of dry matter, global biomass burning releases 84 EJ/yr on the older inventory and 130 EJ/yr on the newer one, corresponding to mean powers of 2.67 TW and 4.13 TW. Fire returns 3.9-6.0% of the energy fixed annually by terrestrial net primary production, and its mean power is 14-21% of human primary energy use. About 14% of the combustion energy leaves as radiation (0.37-0.58 TW). The 2023 Canadian fire season alone released 24.8 EJ at a seasonal mean power of 1.87 TW. AI-use disclosure: this paper was prepared with the assistance of an artificial intelligence system, Dave, which carried out the literature retrieval, computations, and drafting under the author's direction; the author reviewed the results and takes full responsibility for the content.