Global carbon dioxide growth in 2018 reached 4th highest on record

By the end of 2018, NOAA’s atmospheric observatory at Mauna Loa recorded the fourth-highest annual growth in the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in 60 years of record-keeping.

Ozone hole modest despite conditions ripe for depletion

The ozone hole that forms in the upper atmosphere over Antarctica each September was slightly above average size in 2018, NOAA and NASA scientists reported today.

Study sheds light on persistent gap in natural gas methane emissions measurements

It’s a question that’s puzzled policymakers, researchers and regulatory agencies for years: How much methane is being emitted from natural gas operations across the U.S.? And why have the two main estimation methods applied across U.S. oil and gas basins always seem to disagree?

Photo feature: A ‘welcoming’ sun returns to the South Pole

The fall equinox means the end of summer for the Northern Hemisphere, but marks the beginning of spring — and the first glimpse of the sun since March — for scientists at NOAA’s South Pole Atmospheric Baseline Observatory located at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Research Station.

Story map: NOAA Boulder

From the foothills of the Rockies, NOAA’s pioneering science, life-saving products, and enduring contributions to America’s economy have enormous impact.

After a 20 Year hiatus, GMD scientists will return to sampling the stratosphere with the NASA ER-2 aircraft

An airborne project with NOAA and CIRES instrument investigators in the Global Monitoring Division was selected for five-year funding starting in 2020 through 2025 from the NASA Earth Venture Suborbital-3 program (EVS-3).

Stephen Montzka named AGU Fellow

GMD's Stephen Montzka was named an AGU Fellow for the Class of 2018. The American Geophysical Union will honor the Fellows at its fall meeting in Washington, D.C.

Another climate milestone on Mauna Loa

Carbon dioxide levels measured at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Atmospheric Baseline Observatory averaged more than 410 parts per million in April and May, the highest monthly averages ever recorded, scientists from NOAA and Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego announced today.

NOAA’s greenhouse gas index up 41 percent since 1990

NOAA’s Annual Greenhouse Gas Index, which tracks the warming influence of long-lived greenhouse gases, has increased by 41 percent from 1990 to 2017, up 1 percent from 2016 -- with most of that attributable to rising carbon dioxide levels.

Emissions of ozone-destroying chemical controlled by Montreal Protocol rising again, NOAA data shows

Emissions of one of the chemicals most responsible for the Antarctic ozone hole are on the rise, despite an international treaty that required an end to its production in 2010, a new NOAA study shows.
(View paper here).

New National Academies' report lays out path forward for methane research

A new National Academies of Sciences' report calls on several federal agencies to work together to improve techniques for measuring one of the most important greenhouse gases produced by humans - methane.

Featured photo: Last call at the South Pole, for now

As hints of spring appear across the United States, NOAA’s first all-women crew at the South Pole atmospheric observatory are half a world away, ready for Antarctica’s brutal, six-month polar night.

A climate science milestone on Colorado’s Continental Divide

On January 16, 1968, an air sample collected at Niwot Ridge was measured for carbon dioxide at a lab in Boulder, Colorado--the first measurement for NOAA's Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network. In the 50 years since, more than 274,000 air samples have been collected at over 60 sites around the globe.

Move of Bondville, IL Aerosol System to New Facility

Aerosol measurements have been made by the NOAA/ESRL Global Monitoring Division (GMD) at the Bondville Environmental and Atmospheric Research Site (BEARS) since June of 1994. In late October of 2017, the GMD aerosol monitoring system was moved from the aging, uninsulated sea container to a new temperature-controlled building about 80 meters away.

Warm air helped make 2017 ozone hole smallest since 1988

Measurements from satellites this year showed the hole in Earth’s ozone layer that forms over Antarctica each September was the smallest observed since 1988, scientists from NASA and NOAA announced today.