The Data Legacy of the Scripps Carbon Dioxide Program

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This project will support an effort to recover and make available to posterity a larger number of data assets that are part of the iconic Keeling carbon dioxide (CO2) record. The first measurements of atmospheric CO2 to be made with methods of sufficient quality to document changes were those of the late Charles D. Keeling, who initiated a program in the late 1950s at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. This program has continued under the current principal investigator to the present, sustaining the world's longest time series of the ocean and atmosphere, including the well-known Mauna Loa record as well as records from a flask sampling program from an array of stations distributed from the Arctic to the Antarctic.A major component of the study of global climate change is to document changes in the cycling of carbon in the Earth system. This task requires not just ongoing measurements but also careful comparison to records made in the past. Results from this program have been made available through scientific publications, submissions to databases (e.g., CDIAC, the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center) as well as more recently through a dedicated webpage, http://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu. The publicly available data, however, comprise only a fraction of the total body of measurements made by the program. For example, flask CO2 data from extensive ship, airborne, and land-based surveys from the 1950s to 1980s are unavailable in a form amenable to analysis. In addition, these early data can now be interpreted in the context of reanalysis of observed atmospheric wind fields extending back to the 1950s. Many other valuable resources generated at Scripps are also not available in convenient or "final" form. Multi-decadal records from Barrow, Alaska and at La Jolla itself, comprise overlapping measurements from two or more programs or instruments that have not been suitably merged and reconciled. This project will focus on recovering and posting these data in modern digital formats.Potentially valuable meteorological data remains on hand-recorded log sheets, strip charts, magnetic tapes, computer punch cards, or old computer printouts. The key to unlocking these resources is in the minds of senior personnel who are within a few years of the end of their careers. Corrections to the Scripps manometric scale that result from recently-resolved slow deformation of glass volumes with time remain to be finalized. This project will support a concerted effort to develop readily available datasets from these resources, including recovering raw data, reprocessing as needed, merging with other datasets, addressing issues of calibration, presenting data on the group webpage, and archiving at CDIAC.These activities could enable diverse investigations into the distant future. The work is of very broad importance to society in the context of global climate change. The work will further sustain elements of the Scripps CO2 program which is widely considered as the "true beginning" for stories covering the topic of rising CO2 and global warming.