Daily Global Methane Super-Emitter Detection and Source Identification With Sub-Daily Tracking

(Geophysical Research Letters)

Mitigating large, concentrated methane emissions such as gas leaks is vital to curb global warming. Satellites can help in finding the largest methane emitters. We use the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) satellite instruments to observe large methane plumes with a high resolution of 750 m. We show that using the three VIIRS instruments improves current abilities to track large methane emissions. Together with the Sentinel-3 satellites we can now image methane plumes multiple times a day. This is especially important for plumes that result from short-duration emission events. Furthermore, we show that because the observations of one of these VIIRS satellites overlap with those of the TROPOMI instrument, we can directly compare the low-resolution, high-precision measurements of TROPOMI with the high-resolution, but high-noise measurements of VIIRS. This means we can use VIIRS to zoom in on plumes detected by TROPOMI to identify the responsible facility and compare the observed methane plumes, which we find agree well within their respective uncertainties.

A new study recently published in Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, provides new insights into the meteorological processes responsible for the filling of a normally dry lake in the northwestern Sahara. The research offers a fresh perspective on past climate variations and suggests we can learn from past flooding of the lake on ongoing climate change and future water resources in the desert.