How could it be that the IPCC Co2 level readings are no where near historically recorded levels?

Question

Was there some inaccuracy in the measuring and recording methods used.

http://www.bruderheim-rea.ca/warming9.htm

Answer 1

Sure the Vostok ice core samples and the omitted MWP along with some other data.

http://www.elmhurst.edu/~chm/vchembook/g...

Answer 2

If you measured carbon monoxide levels at the tailpipe of your car, it wouldn't tell you much about carbon monoxide in the atmosphere as a whole.

The same is true of carbon dioxide, too. If you measure carbon dioxide next to a coal-fired powerplant, it's gonna be high. Or next to a coal-fired factory.

In the 19th and early 20th century, scientists weren't really aware of the difference it made to be near an industrial center. They didn't know how far away you'd have to be to get a "background" level of CO2. In those days, they just measured where they lived, which was mostly Europe, which was mostly industrialized and coal-powered.

So those high readings weren't false. But from a global perspective, they weren't very useful, either.

Nowadays, we take CO2 readings at points that are as far away from industry as we can get, to make sure we get a good "background" level. That means the top of a mountain in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, or at the South Pole. Combine those with ice-core readings from Antarctica, and you get a good, consistent background level of CO2 that goes back half a million years.

Here's a graph of just the last 10,000 years:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3006/2615...

Answer 3

Why are you getting your scientific information from a website that's "working in the interests of the owners of rural electric services"?

By the way, nobody was around to 'record' CO2 levels millions of years ago, which is when they were higher than now.

*edit* you get your information from this random source and then criticize me for being politically biased and closed-minded?

Hypocrite.

Answer 4

The main source in the link that you posted is "180 years of atmospheric CO2 gas analysis by chemical methods" by Ernst-Georg Beck, published by "Energy & Environment".

No offense intended, but you really need to find better sources. Beck's analysis contains major flaws, and therefore the conclusions are completely wrong.[1][2][3] To summarize, Beck ignores the last fifty years of carbon cycle research.

Answer 5

The Vostok ice cores are not the only ice cores, Australian scientists have also been collecting cores since the 60s from a site called Law Dome it is a high snow fall area, which in layman's terms means a shorter period of data is possible (90000 years instead of the 500000 of other sites) but the accuracy of the data over the shorter period is higher.

Data from this research was also used in IPCC reports 3 & 4.

http://www.aad.gov.au/default.asp?casid=...

Interesting how this

http://images.aad.gov.au/img.py/288b.jpg...

looks nothing like the bruderheim graph

http://bp3.blogger.com/_cs-Bym6c2zU/RgbC...