Climate Change Update: CO2 Levels in the Arctic Have Reached 400 PPM

May 31, 2012

CO2 readings at Mauna Loa, Hawaii — CO2 readings in the Arctic have reached 400 PPM but at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii they are not quite there yet but on the rise growing from 393.28 PPM in 2011 to 396.18 in April 2012. Source: U.S. Department of Commerce

Considered by many scientists to be the highest safe level for the concentration of the gas in the atmosphere – 350 parts per million (PPM) , CO2 levels are well in excess of that number today. Standing globally at 395 PPM, the most recent Arctic readings this spring measure more than 400 PPM.

It has been 800,000 years, based on geological records, since the Earth has seen CO2 levels this high. Readings in Alaska, Greenland, Norway, Iceland and Mongolia this spring have all reached or exceeded the 400 PPM plateau.

Following the year of no winter in most of North America, and a record 12 extreme weather events causing more than $1 billion U.S. in damages, we have witnessed temperature extremes, drought and severe weather on a unprecedented scale.