Wildland fires play an important role in the global carbon (C) cycle, releasing annually ~2.1 Pg of C into the atmosphere in the form of CO2, other greenhouse gases and aerosols. Their net effect on the C cycle, however, goes beyond emissions and involves many other interacting processes that are yet neither fully understood nor quantified. 

A potentially significant, but currently unexplored mechanism by which fire affects the C cycle is through its impact on soil erosion.  Wildland fires can trigger and greatly increase soil and carbon erosion by water in the first months or years after fire, up to several orders of magnitude as compared to pre-fire conditions.

Therefore, if the burial and associated stabilization of eroded C, together with the recovery of net primary production and soil organic carbon in the eroded landscape, exceed the C losses during mobilization, soil C erosion could act as a C sink mechanism.