Is Carbon Dioxide evenly distributed throughout the atmosphere?

Question

Or do the levels vary between latitudes, or elevations.

Can someone find a map/graphical representation of where the carbon in the atmosphere if it is not evenly distributed?

No 5th grader responses please, Im not stupid.

Answer 1

GC is correct, IMO.  Just a note.  When lakes in Africa that are saturated with dissolved CO2 erupt (like shaking a coke can and popping the top), the "cloud" of CO2 will spread out across the land and even standing up might mean the difference between living and suffocating .  CO2 gas will definitely spread lower but eventually it will get mixed up with the rest of the atmosphere.

Answer 2

Yes it is...

Atmospheric gases are not sorted by weight. Gases by nature will diffuse readily, spreading apart in order to uniformly fill the space of any container.

Also, the forces of wind (turbulence) are strong enough to fully intermix even heavy molecules throughout the turbosphere[1] and even into the upper reaches the upper atmosphere.

Here are the results from ten sampling centers scattered around the world and at different altitudes. They all have similar results:

http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/trends/co2/sio...

Answer 3

The thing that controls the vertical concentration of gases is not their weight but the adiabatic temperature.  If weight were the controlling factor then the mixing ratio of water vapor would be constant up to the homopause, which it isn't.  In contrast, the mixing ratio of CO2 is relatively constant through the atmosphere (see reference link) up to very high altitudes.

The difference is that CO2 sublimes at -79 C while water boils at 100 C and freezes at 0 C.  This means that while the partial pressure of CO2 follows PV=nRT for its temperature dependence up to very high altitudes, the partial pressure of H2O is set by the vapor pressure of water (if above 0 C) and the sublimation pressure of ice (if below 0 C).  Since the major gases in the atmosphere except water and CO2 all go as PV=nRT, their mixing ratios are constant with altitude.  The equilibrium vapor pressure of water decreases with altitude (because temperature decreases with altitude and so does the vapor pressure/sublimation pressure) so its mixing ratio decreases.   (see note below)  

I know nobody is going to like/understand this explanation, but it is correct whereas appeals to molecular weight are wrong.  

The latitudinal responses are more or less correct, more CO2 is produced in the northern hemisphere so there is a gradient from north to south.  I'm only taking issue with the people talking about vertical gradients in atmospheric CO2.  

note:  This is also why statements to the effect that water vapor is more important as a greenhouse gas are simplistic in terms of a CO2-induced radiative forcing.  The concentration of CO2 is relatively constant through the troposphere whereas H2O decreases rapidly.  CO2 longwave effects are most important at altitude, where the H2O mixing ratio is much lower than near the surface.

Answer 4

Are you smarter than a 5th grader?

Yes, CO2 is evenly distributed throughout the atmosphere by latitude, but is mostly concentrated in the troposphere vertically.

Answer 5

Actually, no. CO2 is a heavy gas, much heavier than most components of the atmosphere. That means it doesn't mix easily with other gases.

CO2 is produced unevenly throughout the globe due to differences in industrialization. Therefore the highest levels of CO2 are in the northern hemisphere, at a latitude of about 50°. Much of the CO2 we produce is absorbed by natural sinks, but those sinks are also distributed unevenly around the globe. Terrestrial sinks are almost as important as oceanic sinks, in spite of their smaller surface area; that means that CO2 is absorbed more rapidly by the land than by the ocean.

There are also vertical differences in distribution. Since CO2 is a heavy gas, it is relatively depleted at higher altitudes.

Great question. Starred.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/reprint/28...

http://www.osti.gov/energycitations/prod...

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1989JGR......