Maquarie Island Research Station - Atmospheric CO2 level (LOFLO) measurements (2005 to present)

The CSIRO archive of observed atmospheric CO2 concentrations at the Maquarie Island Research Station, measured with the CSIRO developed LOFLO Mk2 instrument. 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 first began at Cape Grim in May 2000 and has since been expanded to other global stations with the newer improved LOFLO Mk2. Stations using LOFLO include Cape Grim, Maquarie Island, Otways Basin and Aspendale. CO2 measurements are available from the Maquarie Island Research Station for the period 1/1/05 until present, 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. Typically file size is approximately 500 KB and 12 MB for an hourly averaged and minutely averaged year of data respectively.