Cape Grim Baseline Air Pollution Station - Atmospheric CO2 level (LOFLO) measurements (2000 to present)

The CSIRO archive of observed atmospheric CO2 concentrations at the Cape Grim Baseline Air Pollution Station in North-West Tasmania, measured with the CSIRO developed LOFLO & LOFLO Mk2 instruments. LOFLO is an analysis system built around a commercial LI-COR 6251 optical bench which utilizes NDIR (non-dispersive infrared) gas analysis technology to measure CO2 concentrations in sample air. Consuming smaller volumes of calibration gases (approx. 15ml/min) and requiring much less operator intervention, LOFLO measurements have significantly less bias than traditional NDIR measurement techniques. Measurements using LOFLO began at Cape Grim in May 2000 and has now been expanded to other global stations with the newer improved LOFLO Mk2. Stations using LOFLO include Cape Grim, Maquarie Island, Otways Basin and Aspendale, with logged data available as yearly ascii text files in hourly averaged and minutely averaged periods for CO2 concentration, standard deviation, max & min values as well as a baseline flag. Conditions are considered baseline when wind directions are between 190 & 280°. Typically file size is approximately 500 KB and 12 MB for an hourly averaged and minutely averaged year of data respectively.