Key Climate-Change Measurement Imperiled

The "Keeling curve," the most famous measurement of the world's rising levels of carbon dioxide for the past six decades, is in jeopardy from funding shortfalls.

The Keeling curve, run by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, is the longest continuous record of carbon dioxide measurements on the planet.  The measurements were begun in 1958 by Scripps climate scientist Charles David Keeling and are taken near the top of Mauna Loa on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Keeling died in 2005, and his son, Ralph, is now the keeper of the "curve."  A physicist himself, he says the ongoing measurements at Mauna Loa are on the "cutting edge of discovering what we're doing to the planet."

Key Climate-Change Measurement Imperiled