Jon Queally
Jon Queally is senior editor and staff writer for Common Dreams.Published May 13, 2019
Despite the new measurement, it’s not as if humanity hasn’t been endlessly warned that it’s on a dangerous path.
Atmospheric levels of carbon registered 415 parts per million over the weekend at one of the world’s key measuring stations, a concentration level researchers say has not existed in more than 3 million years — before the dawn of human history.Taken at the Mauno Loa Observatory in Hawaii by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the measure continues the upward trend of atmospheric carbon concentration that lies at the heart of the global warming and climate crisis:
Meteorologist Eric Holthaus, a journalist who covers the climate crisis for Grist, contextualized the latest readings in a tweet that was shared widely on Sunday:
One person responded to the Holthaus tweet by asking, “How is this not breaking news on all channels all over the world?”
Rich Pancost, head of the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol in the U.K., said that the best guess of the scientific community is that global atmospheric carbon levels have not been this high for “about 3 millions years… [m]aybe more.”
Writing on his Informed Comment blog Monday, historian Juan Cole said that life on Earth in that pre-historic era, known as the Pliocene Period, is not a place humans would recognize:
In the Pliocene, it was much hotter.
In the Pliocene, oceans were much higher, maybe 90 feet higher.
That is our fate, folks. That is what 415ppm produces. It is only a matter of time, and some of the sea level rise will come quickly.
Amsterdam, New Orleans, Lisbon, Miami – the list of cities that will be submerged is enormous.
CO2 Levels Hit 415 Parts Per Million for First Time in Over 3 Million Years – Truthout
Jon Queally Jon Queally is senior editor and staff writer for Common Dreams. More by this author… Published May 13, 2019 Despite the new measurement, it’s not as if humanity hasn’t been endlessly warned that it’s on a dangerous path. Atmospheric levels of carbon registered 415 parts per million over the weekend at one of… [Read More]