There’s striking new evidence that Earth’s atmosphere is increasingly saturated with carbon dioxide, the major gas from fossil fuel emissions that trigger climate change.
Measurements of the climate-changing gas by instruments high on a mountain in Hawaii and around the world show that global emissions from burning fossil fuels rose last month to levels higher than at any time in human history – and higher than it has been in hundreds of thousands of years.
The instruments that have been measuring carbon dioxide for more than 50 years showed that for the entire month of April, levels of the gas exceeded 400 parts per million for the first time, said Pieter Tans, a climate scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency who monitors the instrument record.