Using satellites to estimate US methane emissions

Daniel J. Jacob

with Kevin Wecht, Alex Turner, Melissa Sulprizio

with support from the NASA Carbon Monitoring System

Importance of methane for climate policy

• Present-day emission-based forcing of methane is 0.95 W m-2 , compared to 1.8 W m-2 for CO2 (IPCC AR5)

• Climate impact of methane is comparable to CO2 over 20-year horizon

• Methane emission control is a low-cost option for climate policy

• Increases in natural gas production/use, hydrofracking have potential to increase US source of methane

• Methane is a central piece of the President’s Climate Action Plan

Building a methane monitoring system for N America

EDGAR emissionInventory for methane

Can we use satellites together with suborbital observations of methane to monitor methane emissions on the continental scale and test/improve emission inventories in a manner useful to stakeholders?

Methane bottom-up emission inventories for N. America: EDGAR 4.2 (anthropogenic), LPJ (wetlands)

N American totals in Tg a-1

Surface/aircraft studies suggest that these emissions are too low by ~factor 2

AIRS, TES, IASI

Methane observing system in North America

Satellites

2002 2006 2009 20015 2018

Thermal IR

SCIAMACHY 6-day

GOSAT3-day, sparse

TROPOMI GCIRI 1-day geoShortwave IR

Suborbital

CalNex

INTEX-A

SEAC4RS

1/2ox2/3o grid of GEOS-Chem chemical transport model (CTM)

High-resolution inverse analysis system for quantifying methane emissions in North America

GEOS-Chem CTM and its adjoint50 km resolution over N. America

nested in 4ox5o global domain

Observations

Bayesianinversion

Optimized emissionsat 50 km resolution

Validation Verification

EDGAR 4.2 + LPJa priori bottom-up emissions

The same inverse analysis system is used at JPL for CO2 (K. Bowman, PI)

North American methane emission estimatesoptimized by SCIAMACHY + INTEX-A data (Jul-Aug 2004)

1700 1800ppb

SCIAMACHY column methane mixing ratio Correction factors to EDGAR emissions

Livestock Oil & Gas Landfills Coal Mining Other0

5

10

15US anthropogenic emissions (Tg a-1)

EDGAR v4.2 26.6

EPA 28.3

This work 32.7

Wecht et al., in prep.

1000 clusters

Livestock emissions are underestimated by EPA, oil/gas emissions are not

GOSAT methane column mixing ratios, Oct 2009-2010

Retrieval from U. Leicester

Inversion of GOSAT Oct 2009-2010 methane

Nested inversionwith 50x50 km2 resolution

Correction factors to prior emissions (EDGAR 4.2 + LPJ)

Alex Turner, Harvard

Next step: clustering of emissions in the inversion, use new NASA retrieval

Testing the information content of satellite datawith CalNex inversion of methane emissions

CalNex observations GEOS-Chem w/EDGAR v4.2 Correction factors to EDGAR

1800 2000ppb

May-Jun2010

Wecht et al., in prep.

S. Wofsy (Harvard)

Livestock Gas/oil Landfills Other0

0.4

0.8

1.2California emissions (Tg a-1) EDGAR v4.2 1.92

CARB 1.51

This work 2.86

GOSAT observations of methane are too sparseto constrain California emissions

GOSAT data (CalNex period)) Correction factors to EDGAR emissions

Each point =1-10 observations

0.5 1.5

Wecht et al., in prep.

…but they do provide qualitative indication of corrections to emission inventories

TROPOMI (2015 launch) will constrain methane emissions as well as a CalNex-type aircraft campaign

Wecht et al., in prep.

Correction factors to EDGAR emissionsin observation system simulation experiment (OSSE) inversions for CalNex period

A geostationary mission (several current proposals) would allow fine-scale monitoring

Working with stakeholders at the US state level

State-by-state analysis of SCIAMACHY correction factors to EDGARv4.2 emissions

with Iowa Dept. of Natural Resources (Marnie Stein)

State emissions computed w/EPA tools too low by x3.5;now investigating EPA livestock emission factors

with New York Attorney General Office (John Marschilok)State-computed emissions too high by x0.6,reflects overestimate of gas/waste/landfill emissions

Melissa Sulprizio and Kevin Wecht, Harvard

Hog manure?

Large EDGAR source from gas+landfillsis just not there

0 1 2correction factor

What next?

• Develop a clustering algorithm to extract the maximum information from the GOSAT satellite data

• Impose a temperature dependence on livestock emissions (can we assume no seasonality for oil/gas emissions?)

• Conduct a 2009-present inversion of GOSAT data together with surface observations (NOAA, TCCON), interpret results

• Interact with stakeholders (API!) on the implications of results and to guide future work

• Get ready for TROPOMI!

satellites

suborbital platforms

models

AQAST

Pollution monitoringExposure assessmentAQ forecastingSource attribution Quantifying emissionsExternal influencesAQ processesClimate interactions

AQAST

AQAST members

• Daniel Jacob (leader), Loretta Mickley (Harvard)• Tracey Holloway (deputy leader), Steve Ackerman (U. Wisconsin); Bart Sponseller (Wisconsin DNR)• Greg Carmichael (U. Iowa)• Dan Cohan (Rice U.)• Russ Dickerson (U. Maryland)• Bryan Duncan, Yasuko Yoshida, Melanie Follette-Cook (NASA/GSFC); Jennifer Olson (NASA/LaRC)• David Edwards (NCAR) • Arlene Fiore (Columbia Univ.); Meiyun Lin (Princeton)• Jack Fishman, Ben de Foy (Saint Louis U.)• Daven Henze, Jana Milford (U. Colorado)• Edward Hyer, Jeff Reid, Doug Westphal, Kim Richardson (NRL)• Pius Lee, Tianfeng Chai (NOAA/NESDIS)• Yang Liu, Matthew Strickland (Emory U.), Bin Yu (UC Berkeley)• Richard McNider, Arastoo Biazar (U. Alabama – Huntsville)• Brad Pierce (NOAA/NESDIS)• Ted Russell, Yongtao Hu, Talat Odman (Georgia Tech); Lorraine Remer (NASA/GSFC)• David Streets (Argonne)• Jim Szykman (EPA/ORD/NERL)• Anne Thompson, William Ryan, Suellen Haupt (Penn State U.)

What makes AQAST unique?

All AQAST projects connect Earth Science and air quality management: active partnerships with air quality managers with deliverables/outcomes self-organizing to respond quickly to demands flexibility in how it allocates its resources INVESTIGATOR PROJECTS (IPs): members adjust work plans each year to

meet evolving AQ needs “TIGER TEAM” PROJECTS (TTs): multi-member efforts to address

emerging, pressing problems requiring coordinated activity

Recently selected Tiger Team projects include:• Web-enabled AQ management tools• AQ reanalysis• Dynamical natural inputs for AQ models • Source attribution for O3 and PM events over EUS• Oil & gas emissions• Satellite-derived NOx emissions and trends

www.aqast.org: click on “projects” for brief descriptions + link to pdf describing each project

Scope of current AQAST projects

AQ agency

• Local: RAQC, BAAQD• State: TCEQ, MDE, Wisconsin DNR, CARB, Iowa DNR, GAEPD, GFC• Regional: LADCO, EPA Region 8 • National: EPA, NOAA, NPS

Theme

SIP

Mo

del

ing

A

Q p

roce

sses

Mo

nit

ori

ng

A

Q-C

limat

e

B

ackg

rou

nd

IC

/BC

fo

r A

Q m

od

els

Fo

reca

stin

g

E

mis

sio

ns

F

utu

re s

atel

lites

Earth Science resource

Satellites: MODIS, MISR, MOPITT, AIRS, OMI, TES, GOES, GOME-2

Suborbital: ARCTAS, DISCOVER-AQ, ozonesondes, PANDORA

Models: MOZART, CAM, AM-3, GEOS-Chem, RAQMS, STEM, GISS, CMIP

We need to findIndustry partners!

To subscribe to newsletter, send email to aqast_news-join@seas.harvard.edu(leave subject and body blank)

Semiannual AQAST meetings• Share knowledge and experience in using Earth Science data and tools

for serving AQ management• Educate AQ managers in the use of Earth Science data and tools,

educate Earth scientists on AQ needs• Hear about pressing AQ management issues, and determine how

AQAST can help

AQAST meeting at U. Maryland (June 9-11, 2013)

Next meeting (AQAST 6) is January 15-17 in Houston:http://acmg.seas.harvard.edu/aqast/meetings/2014_janWe hope to have API members attend, and present!