The Mauna Loa Observatory predicts that global carbon dioxide levels will exceed 400ppm all year for the first time in recorded history and not recede for many generations into the future This is the recognized red line for disastrous climate change. The World Meteorological Organization said its annual "Greenhouse Gas Bulletin" that the strong El Nino event of 2015-16 has reduced the ability of natural sinks such as oceans and forests to absorb CO₂. These sinks absorb about half of the global carbon dioxide emissions. Those emissions have increased 37% in the period 1990 to 2015. The organization calls for implementation of the Paris Climate Agreement on a fast track.
In related news, Chinese environmental officials including the local bureau chief were arrested recently for their involvement in a scheme to alter air quality readings by stuffing cotton gauze into detection equipment in the industrial city of Xi'an. The head of the monitoring station made a copy of a key and provided a password to allow workers to stuff the detection equipment and report fraudulent readings to the government. Video surveillance tapes were also deleted. An insider told reporters the sabotage was accomplished to avoid paying penalties for high readings; air quality officials must shut down local industry if air quality becomes too impaired. Last year the government discovered that another monitoring station altered its particulate readings by spraying samplers with a fire hose.