Russia’s Amazon

When exactly will the forest end? I had this thought 30-odd years ago while crossing the Russian taiga on the Trans-Siberian Railroad from St. Petersburg to Irkutsk. For hours and then days, the massive boreal aggregation of pines and firs, hemlocks and spruces strobed past the train’s windows — a veritable sea of green that seemed to defy all boundaries of what I imagined an intact ecosystem looked like. I thought again of the endless-seeming taiga this month as Russia embarked on an endless-seeming war. With sanctions effectively severing the country from the Western financial system there is a real risk that it will lean even more heavily on its forests. And if this happens, Russia could quickly transform itself from a carbon sink into a planet toaster. <a href="https://4fishgreenberg.medium.com/russias-amazon-29be59b23732">Read More</a>