Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is rising at the fastest rate ever recorded

Smoke billows from smokestacks
 and a coal-fired generator at a steel
factory in November 2015 in the
industrial province of Hebei, China. 

For the second year in a row, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have climbed at a record pace. According to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, carbon dioxide levels jumped by three parts per million in both 2015 and 2016 and now rest at about 405 parts per million.

It’s the biggest jump ever observed at the agency’s Mauna Loa Baseline Atmospheric Observatory in Hawaii, where the measurements were recorded. Similar observations have been recorded at stations all over the world, said Pieter Tans, who leads the Carbon Cycle Greenhouse Gases group at NOAA’s Greenhouse Gas Reference Network.

Throughout the last decade, the average rate of increase has been around 2.3 parts per million per year, Tans added.

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