The pre-Industrial world society was the time before machines were invented to take the place of agriculture and hand craft based localized economies. Simple methods of production were limited and there was minimum communication between communities. This was life on Earth that commenced after the last Ice Age ended and made progress right up to around 1760, when mechanization commenced.  A natural climate made up of nature’s carbon and water cycles was on a 10,000 year run totally uninfluenced by the deeds of humanity.

Then entered the Industrial Revolution, generally lasting from 1750 to 1840, which was the transition period from making goods by hand to using machines. This development occurred due to capitalism, Europe’s imperialism and the agricultural revolt to create low food costs that allowed people surplus money to spend elsewhere. This was to be the finale of a naturally regulated climate and not a soul was aware during that ninety year juncture.

CO2 concentration in our atmosphere is measured at a level of parts per million particles, or ppm. This is our barometer for following global warming because as this index level increases, the heat trapping effect of CO2 becomes more obvious. It’s important to know that this critical factor of climate change was around 280 parts per million (ppm) during those thousands of years prior to the mid 1800s. And during that time, Earth’s natural carbon sinks consisted of oceans, forests and soils that naturally managed the process of removing excess carbon from the atmosphere. However, as humanity began putting more CO2 into the vast skies than the natural sinks could remove, the ppm index began to slowly rise over the next 100 years, and the turning point for global warming began around 1950 at a measurement level registering in at the 300 ppm range. 

Led by an exploding human population and an unparalleled acceleration of economic development, this is the point in human history when everything related to civilization began an unprecedented rapid change. 

Soon, the CO2 ppm increased to a level where it surpassed the ability for nature’s carbon sinks to function, and the concentration began to rise at an alarming rate. More carbon unnaturally began to be released into the air and oceans than natural processes could come close to absorbing. During the 1960’s, it rose a mere .01 per year, then expanded dramatically decades later to over 2 points per year. The last recorded CO2 concentration factor was at 424 ppm registered in May of 2023 - the highest since 4 million years ago and a 3 point increase over 2022. We are closing in on a 50% ppm increase in just about the last 75 years, after a 10,000 year period of time when it barely budged. It is a tiny quantity per million particles in our air, but that is how controlling and dense it is. As this gas leads the other poisonous emissions in terms of bogging down the atmosphere with their heat baking ability, the more Earth’s average annual temperature increases. Excessive amounts of greenhouse gasses prevent great volumes of heat from exiting our atmosphere into space, thus allowing the remaining surplus heat to be defined as global warming. It was literally a life saving moment when the science community intervened with the United Nations to limit just how much our planet’s average temperature will be allowed to increase - before it becomes irreversible.