CO2 Records

Details
Last Updated: 12 May 2020 12 May 2020

banner co2 earth co2 records peter boccia RCs VtyUVd8 unsplash 1500 photo by peter boccia

  

 

Highest-Ever

Mauna Loa CO2 Levels

in recorded human history 

 Averages

NOAA MLO 

Scripps MLO 
Daily
CO2

418.12 ppm

May 3, 2020

data1 & data2

 

417.91 ppm

April 9, 2020

data
Weekly
CO2

416.83 ppm

May 3 - 9, 2020 

data

 

415.08 ppm

May 12-18, 2019

data
Monthly
CO2

416.21 ppm

April 2020

data

 

416.18 ppm

April 2020

data
Yearly
CO2

 411.44 ppm

2019

data

411.49 ppm

2019

monthly data averaged

 

Year after year, CO2 levels keep breaking new records for the highest level and the fastest speed.  And these records extend a century of increases at levels beyond what any pre-industrial homo sapien had experienced since our species first graced the Earth (plus millions of yeas before that).  For the industrial era records we have achieved, it's our species that gets the medals. Bronze, silver and gold.  

The achievements are surely among the saddest on the planet.  They are a sobering reminder of the chemical changes we just keep making to the atmosphere.  Despite the climate and life-altering consequences across the planet.

Marking the latest CO2 records is not an act of celebration, but of bearing witness.  The records invite reflection and resolve to make the transformations that gets us to the year without any new CO2 records.  That could be humanity's greatest collective achievement to date.  And the year for the biggest global party in history.