A Global Decline in Carbon Monoxide

For more than two decades, NASA’s Terra satellite has measured atmospheric concentrations of carbon monoxide (CO). “We’ve seen carbon monoxide levels drop because cleaner-burning technologies are much more common now in the United States, Western Europe, and Eastern China due to stricter air quality standards,” explained Rebecca Buchholz, an atmospheric scientist at the NCAR's Atmospheric Chemistry Observations & Modeling laboratory (ACOM). “We’ve also seen a reduction in fires and burned area in the tropics.” The research findings were published in Remote Sensing of the Environment.