Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here

by NotRepublicanOrDemocrat Fri Jun 01, 2012 8:35 am

Well let's see... The only "experts" that say there is no global warming are Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. There are idiots out there who actually believe them!

NOAA: Carbon dioxide levels reach milestone at Arctic sites

NOAA cooperative measurements in remote, northern sites hit greenhouse gas milestone in April

May 31, 2012
Contact: Katy Human

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
of Barrow, Alaska, reached 400 parts per million (ppm) this spring,
according to NOAA measurements, the first time a monthly average
measurement for the greenhouse gas attained the 400 ppm mark in a remote
location.

Carbon dioxide (CO2), emitted by fossil fuel
combustion and other human activities, is the most significant
greenhouse gas contributing to climate change.

Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here Barrow-AK-caption

Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here Barrow-AK-caption

“The northern sites in our monitoring network tell us
what is coming soon to the globe as a whole,” said Pieter Tans, an
atmospheric scientist with NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory
(ESRL) in Boulder, Colo. “We will likely see global average CO2
concentrations reach 400 ppm about 2016.”

Carbon dioxide at six other remote northern sites in
NOAA’s international cooperative air sampling network also reached 400
ppm at least once this spring: at a second site in Alaska and others in
Canada, Iceland, Finland, Norway, and an island in the North Pacific.

Measurements at all those remote sites reflect
background levels of CO2, influenced by long-term human emissions around
the world, but not directly by emissions from a nearby population
center. At other more locally influenced sites in NOAA’s network, such
as Cape May, N.J., upwind cities influence CO2 concentrations, which
have exceeded 400 ppm in spring for several years.

“Turning up
the levels of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere is like turning up the
dial on an electric blanket,” said Jim Butler, director of the ESRL
Global Monitoring Division. “You know it will keep getting warmer, but
you don’t know how quickly the temperature will rise, and it can take
awhile for the blanket – or the atmosphere – to heat up.”

Average global levels of CO2 were 390.4 ppm in 2011, according to NOAA measurements, and will likely reach 400 ppm about 2016. Before the Industrial Revolution of the 1880s, global average CO2 was about 280 ppm.

Scientists with ESRL’s Global Monitoring Division keep
track of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere in two ways.
First, the group coordinates an international cooperative flask sampling
network in which scientists and volunteers at more than 60 sites around
the world collect air samples weekly, shipping them back to Colorado
for detailed laboratory analysis. Secondly, the group maintains six
baseline observatories around the world, where staff collect flasks for
analysis and also measure CO2 continuously, along with many other
aspects of the atmosphere and solar radiation.

In Barrow, Alaska, the only remote northern site with
continual CO2 monitoring, the average monthly value of CO2 reached
400.00 ppm for the first time in April. Flask measurements made at
Barrow and other remote northern sites from the North Pacific to Norway
also showed CO2 levels periodically reaching 400 this spring.

Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here CO2-flasks-esrl-caption

Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here CO2-flasks-esrl-caption

The remote, high latitude northern sites reached 400
ppm first in April and May, the peak of the natural CO2 cycle. Plant
growth cycles remove the gas from the air during late spring and summer
and add it back during fall, winter and early spring. This annual cycle
is largest at Northern high latitudes. During June through August, CO2
will fall again, and next April and May it is expected be to 402 ppm or
higher at the same northern sites.

Every year since 1959, when David Keeling of the
Scripps Institution of Oceanography made the first accurate measurements
of CO2 in the atmosphere, the concentration of the greenhouse gas has
increased. In the early 1960s, it rose about 0.7 ppm per year. For the
last decade, it has been rising at about 2 ppm per year. That observed
increase, independent of the seasonal ups and downs described above, is
due to the accelerating pace of emissions from human activities,
particularly the burning of fossil fuels.

This spring’s numbers are technically “preliminary,”
and will not be finalized until next year, but rarely change more than
0.2 ppm, Tans said.

Carbon dioxide is not the only greenhouse gas. NOAA
calculates the Annual Greenhouse Gas Index every year, which takes into
account the heating effects of other gases that are emitted from human
activities (e.g., methane, nitrous oxide, and chemicals called
chlorofluorocarbons). When those gases are also considered, the global
atmosphere reached a CO2 equivalent concentration of 400 ppm in 1985;
and 450 ppm in 2003. Atmospheric CO2 levels are currently higher than
they have been at any time during the last 800,000 years. Watch a NOAA
Earth System Research Laboratory animation of carbon dioxide levels for
the past 800,000 years on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXHDwdd7Tf8.

NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict changes in
the Earth's environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of
the sun, and to conserve and manage our coastal and marine resources.
Visit the NOAA at www.noaa.gov and join us on Facebook, Twitter, and our other social media channels. Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here Noaameatball

Carbon Dioxide Levels Off The Charts - It's All Downhill From Here Noaameatball