Development of a Northern Continental Air Standard Reference Material

Published

February 18, 2016

Author(s)

George C. Rhoderick, Duane Kitzis, Michael E. Kelley, Walter R. Miller Jr., Bradley Hall, Edward Dlugokencky, Pieter Tans, Antonio M. Possolo, Jennifer Carney

Abstract

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) recently began to develop standard mixtures of greenhouse gases as part of a broad program mandated by the 2009 United States Congress to support research in climate change. To this end, NIST made suites of gravimetrically assigned primary standard mixtures (PSMs) comprising carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) in a dry-natural air balance at ambient molar fraction levels. In parallel, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Boulder, Colorado, charged thirty aluminum gas cylinders with northern hemisphere air at Niwot Ridge, Colorado. NOAA, the Central Calibration Laboratory (CCL) for the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) Program for CO2, CH4 and N2O, analyzed the gas cylinder samples for these components compared to their manometric (CO2) and gravimetric (CH4 and N2O) calibration standards. Subsequently, NIST analyzed the same cylinder samples with instrumentation calibrated in terms of the NIST PSM mixture suites, resulting in an independent set of certified concentration values. These mixtures, which constitute NIST Standard Reference Material (SRM) 1720 Northern Continental Air, were certified for ambient molar fractions of CO2, CH4 and N2O, represent the first of their kind for NIST. Relative expanded uncertainties at the 95 % confidence interval are

Citation

Journal of Analytical Chemistry

Pub Type

Journals

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DOI Link

Keywords

Standard Reference Material (SRM), Long-Lived Greenhouse Gases (LLGHG), Northern Continental Air, Gravimetric Preparation, Primary Standard Mixture (PSM)

Citation

Rhoderick, G. , Kitzis, D. , Kelley, M. , Miller, W. , Hall, B. , Dlugokencky, E. , Tans, P. , Possolo, A. and Carney, J. (2016), Development of a Northern Continental Air Standard Reference Material, Journal of Analytical Chemistry, [online], https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.analchem.6b00123 (Accessed October 23, 2025)