The fires are often deliberately lit by companies using slash-and-burn techniques to make land suitable mostly for palm oil, paper and other agricultural industries.
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The ships will only be used if other efforts, including moving residents to government offices with air purifiers, prove unsuccessful, said Mr Luhut.
Malaysia’s iconic Petronas twin towers and Kuala Lumpur’s skyline are shrouded in thick haze on Wednesday (Oct. 21). Southern Thailand is recording its worst haze levels in a decade, prompting the Thai authorities to urge Indonesia to do more to mitigate the crisis.
The World Resources Institute said in a recent report that since early September carbon emissions from the fires had exceeded average USA daily output on 26 out of 44 days.
Although Germany has one of the worst air pollution problems in Europe, try this on for size: The pollution generated from the fires is also greater than the single-day emissions of the second-largest producer of greenhouse gases on the planet, the United States. The WRI, a US-based research organisation that focuses on environment and development issues, normally classifies Indonesia as the fifth-biggest emitter.
It added the burning of tropical peatlands was hugely significant for greenhouse gas emission, as this type of soil stores high quantities of carbon on earth, accumulated over thousands of years.
They’ve burned for weeks, producing toxic smoke that has blanketed much of Southeast Asia and caused air quality to plummet.
National Disaster Management Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho told The Straits Times that there were more than 2,740 hot spots detected across Indonesia Thursday morning.
The current outbreak is being exacerbated by the El Nino weather phenomenon which has led to a dramatic increase in temperature and dry conditions, creating extreme drought and crop losses.
The fires on the huge islands of Sumatra and Borneo are typically only brought under control by November with the onset of the rainy season.
Van der Werf’s team found that more than 4,700 fires were burning in Indonesia on October. 14 alone.
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About 30 planes are now involved in water-bombing and artificially inducing rain, with Singaporean, Australian and Malaysian aircraft having taken part.
