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Published online 24 October 2007 | Nature 449, 960 (2007) | doi:10.1038/449960b

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Greenhouse-gas sensors tower over California

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  • We appreciate Nature's reporting the greenhouse gas (GHG) measurements we initiated on tall towers in California. Readers should note that this work was planned, and is now being conducted, in collaboration with the Global Monitoring Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, with support from the California Energy Commission. By design, the data obtained from this effort will be used to both evaluate the feasibility of estimating regional GHG emissions within California, and to improve prospects for estimating GHG emissions at the national scale in support of the North American Carbon Program. Marc L. Fischer, CALGEM Project Leader, Atmospheric Science Department, Environmental Energy Technologies Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

    • 25 Oct, 2007
    • Posted by: Marc Fischer

  • Published concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide are almost exclusively over the ocean, and then only when values are almost constant. Measurements from land areas are hardly ever given. Radiative forcing is calculated from the ocean value only, but actual radiative forcing, for example over California, is surely related to the actual measured concentrations over California. Since the calculation involves an equation using the logarithm of the concentration, low concentrations have a larger weight in any average than the high concentrations.

    • 26 Oct, 2007
    • Posted by: Vincent Gray