2023-06-06 13:27:28
CO2 levels measured at NOAA’s global reference observatory in Hawaii reached a maximum of 424 parts per million in May, reaching levels not seen in millions of years.
These measurements of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, obtained by the NOAA Global Monitoring Laboratory, correspond to the month of the year in which peaks in the northern hemisphere. That’s an increase of 3.0 ppm from May 2022 and represents the fourth largest annual increase in the peak of the Keeling curve in NOAA’s record.
Scientists at the Scripps Oceanographic Institution, which maintains an independent registry, calculated a May monthly average of 423.78 ppm, also an increase of 3.0 ppm, over the May 2022 average.
It is important to point out that a couple of years ago Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft and philanthropist dedicated to the fight once morest climate change, warned that humanity has until 2050 to eliminate the 51 billion tons of greenhouse gases that it produces annually. , or otherwise, there will be a climate catastrophe that would be inevitable to stop.
Gates explained that if that goal is not reached, a large portion of the territories that are in the northern and southern hemispheres of planet Earth would become uninhabitable, Because temperatures would be so high that they would make it impossible to grow food or carry out activities such as livestock. Added to this, it is possible that solar radiation hits with more force in those areas, which would increase the risk of cancer for those who inhabit these places.
As a result of this situation, humanity would enter into a migratory process of enormous proportions and that would cause the territories located on the equator line to also become uninhabitable due to the large concentration of inhabitants that would occur in that area.
Therefore, the species human might be in danger of extinction due to the lack of food and space to live.
On the other hand, Rick Spinrad, administrator of NOAA, has assured that “every year we see increasing levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere, as a direct result of human activity.”
“Every year, we see the impacts of climate change in heat waves, droughts, floods, forest fires and storms that occur around us. While we will have to adapt to climate impacts that we cannot avoid, we must do everything we can to reduce carbon pollution, safeguard this planet and the life we call home,” added Spinrad.
Carbon dioxide pollution is generated by the burning of fossil fuels for transportation and electricity generation, by cement manufacturing, deforestation, agriculture, and many other practices. Like other greenhouse gases, CO2 traps heat radiating from the planet’s surface that would otherwise escape into spaceamplifying extreme weather events such as heat waves, droughts and wildfires, as well as rainfall and flooding.
This year, the NOAA measurements were obtained from a temporary sampling site atop the Mauna Kea volcano, which was established following lava flows cut off access to the Mauna Loa observatory in November 2022. The measurements Scripps in May were taken at Mauna Loa following NOAA personnel repowered a Scripps instrument with a solar and battery system in March.
Data from Mauna Loa, along with measurements from sampling stations around the world, are incorporated by NOAA’s Global Monitoring Laboratory into the Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network, a fundamental research dataset for international climate scientists and a point of reference for policymakers trying to address the causes and impacts of climate change.
Widely considered the world’s premier sampling site for monitoring atmospheric CO2, operations at the Scripps Observatory and NOAA were abruptly suspended on November 29, 2022, when lava flows from the eruption of the Mauna Loa volcano buried more than a mile from the access road and destroyed the transmission lines that supply power to the observatory campus.
After a 10-day outage, NOAA resumed greenhouse gas observations Dec. 8 from a temporary instrument facility on the deck of the University of Hawaii Observatory, located near the top of Mauna Kea volcano. Scripps began air sampling on Mauna Kea on December 14, 2022, and resumed sampling on Mauna Loa on March 9, maintaining his observations on Mauna Kea.
Scripps obtained continuous daily samples from both Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea during May, the month that CO2 levels in the northern hemisphere reach their maximum levels of the year. Scripps recorded a May CO2 reading from Mauna Kea of 423.83 ppm, which is very close to the Mauna Loa observatory’s reading of 423.78 ppm.
The Mauna Loa observatory is located at an elevation of 3,395 meters above sea level, while the Mauna Kea sampling site is slightly higher, at an elevation of 4,145 meters. Scientists can sample the air without being disturbed by the influence of local pollution or vegetation, and produce measurements that represent the average state of the atmosphere in the northern hemisphere, from both locations.
With information from Europa Press
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