How much carbon dioxide is in the atmosphere

During the Cold War, the absorption of infrared radiation by many different gases was studied extensively. The work was led by the US Air Force, which was developing heat-seeking missiles and needed to understand how to detect heat passing through air. This research enabled scientists to understand the climate and atmospheric composition of all planets in the Solar System by observing their infrared signatures.

For example, Venus is about F C because its thick atmosphere is It also informed weather forecast and climate models, allowing them to quantify how much infrared radiation is retained in the atmosphere and returned to Earth's surface. People sometimes ask me why carbon dioxide is important for climate, given that water vapor absorbs more infrared radiation and the two gases absorb at several of the same wavelengths.

The reason is that Earth's upper atmosphere controls the radiation that escapes to space. The upper atmosphere is much less dense and contains much less water vapor than near the ground, which means that adding more carbon dioxide significantly influences how much infrared radiation escapes to space.

Have you ever noticed that deserts are often colder at night than forests, even if their average temperatures are the same? Without much water vapor in the atmosphere over deserts, the radiation they give off escapes readily to space. In more humid regions radiation from the surface is trapped by water vapor in the air. Similarly, cloudy nights tend to be warmer than clear nights because more water vapor is present. The influence of carbon dioxide can be seen in past changes in climate.

One distinction to keep in mind for now has to do with how long each of these options sequesters CO2. For instance, if captured CO2 is used to make synthetic fuels, the fuels are then burned, at which point the CO2 is released back into the atmosphere. Enhanced oil recovery can be done in concert with permanent geological carbon sequestration, but it rarely is today.

Of the various other categories of CCU, only construction materials and possibly new materials like carbon fiber can claim to sequester CO2 semi-permanently. When you inject CO2 into concrete, the concrete is then used in a building which could last up to a century; then, if the building comes down, the concrete can be broken up and re-used.

The CO2 stays put, chemically bonded. This distinction matters in contemplating the total mitigation potential of CCU. Only a small slice of it can ever claim to be carbon-negative; its sequestration potential is limited. For the most part, its benefit will come from replacing carbon-intensive processes with carbon-neutral ones, avoiding carbon emissions.

And even that potential may be limited; more on that in the fourth post. At best it will help lay the foundation for CCS. Still, a lot has changed since Renewable energy has gotten cheaper and CO2 conversion has improved.

At the very least, CCU is one of many potentially carbon abating technologies that deserves much more attention and support than it is currently getting from policymakers. It also means building the capacity to bury hundreds of gigatons of carbon. Insofar as CCU can help get that going — an open question, for now — it is worth pursuing.

In part two, we will take a closer look at enhanced oil recovery, the dominant current use of CO2. On one hand, it uses infrastructure that could easily be repurposed for carbon sequestration in areas that tend to be suitable for carbon sequestration. On the other hand, it empowers oil companies.

We shall grapple with that dilemma. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower through understanding. Financial contributions from our readers are a critical part of supporting our resource-intensive work and help us keep our journalism free for all. Please consider making a contribution to Vox today to help us keep our work free for all.

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Environmental statistics. Endangered species statistics. The new instrument, installed on the exterior of the space station, will extend and enhance the OCO-2 data set by collecting the first dawn-to-dusk observations of variations in carbon dioxide from space over tropical and mid-latitude regions, giving scientists a better view of emission and absorption processes.

The Copernicus CO2 Mission, scheduled for launch around , will be the first operational carbon dioxide monitoring satellite constellation. In fact, it will have the ability to estimate the emissions of every large power plant in every city around the world.

You can only manage what you can measure. A chart showing the steadily increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in parts per million observed at NOAA's Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii over the course of 60 years.

Measurements of the greenhouse gas began in Credit: NOAA. Positive anomalies are most likely sources of carbon dioxide, while negative anomalies are most likely to be sinks, or reservoirs, of carbon dioxide. The effects of the El Nino were different in each region.