Largest Spike in Atmospheric CO2 Recorded at Hawaii's Mauna Loa Observatory in 2024

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Observatory in Hawaii recorded the largest spike in atmospheric carbon dioxide () concentrations in 2024. Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels measured by weather stations on Mauna Loa rose by 3.58 parts per million (ppm) in 2024, the largest spike since records began in 1958.

“We’re still going in the wrong direction,” said climate scientist Richard Betts of the UK’s Met Office, as quoted by New Scientist, Wednesday, January 22, 2025.

The record increase was partly due to CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion and other human activities, such as deforestation, which reached record levels in 2024, coupled with a large number of wildfires fueled by record-breaking global temperatures and exacerbated by the El Niño weather pattern.

Betts predicts that atmospheric CO2 levels measured on Mauna Loa will rise by 2.26 ppm this year, with a margin of error of 0.56 ppm in either direction. “You could think of this as another event that causes 1.5°C to fail,” Betts said. “Now that’s almost impossible.”

The phrase suggests that with this spike in CO2 levels, achieving the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C is increasingly unlikely.

The Mauna Loa Observatory, which has the longest record and is located far from major CO2 emitters and sinks, is often used to proxy global changes in CO2 concentrations. Using satellite observations, global CO2 levels also rose by 2.9 ppm in 2024. While not a record, it is one of the largest increases since satellite observations began.

Richard Engelen of the European Union’s Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service said: “The reasons for this larger increase require further investigation, but it will be a combination of a recovery in emissions in many parts of the world after the Covid pandemic coupled with interannual variations in natural carbon uptake.”

Betts also cautioned that less and less excess will be absorbed as the planet warms.

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