New map of methane ‘super emitters’ shows some of the largest methane clouds ever seen
Some of the largest clouds of heat-trapping methane gas ever detected are floating over New Mexico, Iran and several other “super-emitting” hot spots around the world, according to a new NASA report.
Methane is a powerful greenhouse gases which contributes to the warming of the atmosphere. Although less abundant than carbon dioxide (CO2), methane can trap 80 times more heat pound for pound than CO2, according to NASA (opens in a new tab). Human activities such as fossil fuels, natural gas, agriculture, and waste industries contribute methane to the atmosphere, and understanding where hot spots of methane emissions are can help scientists better understand the impact of humanity in climate warming.
NASA Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT (opens in a new tab)), which was installed on the International Space Station in July to help scientists understand how dust affects climate changemanaged to detect plumes of methane as well.
EMIT identified more than 50 methane “superemitters,” or facilities and infrastructure that emit methane at high rates. These super emitters are found all over the world, from the American Southwest to Central Asia and the Middle East.
Related: There is so much methane in this arctic lake that you can light the air on fire
Super emitters detected by EMIT include an oil field in New Mexico, southeast of Carlsbad; oil and gas infrastructure in Turkmenistan east of the Caspian Sea port city of Hazar; and a waste processing complex south of Iran’s capital, Tehran.
The methane plumes from these sources ranged from 2 miles (3.3 kilometers) to 20 miles (32 km) wide, and researchers estimate that these three sources together emit about 170,000 pounds (77,110 kilograms) of methane per hour.
“Some of the plumes detected by EMIT are among the largest ever seen, unlike anything seen from space,” said Andrew Thorpe, a scientist who leads the EMIT methane research at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. in a statement from NASA. “What we have found in a short time already exceeds our expectations.”
EMIT was originally designed to help researchers understand another atmospheric phenomenon that affects climate: powder that is carried around the world of the largest deserts on Earth. The minerals that make up the dust can either trap or reflect heat, depending on their chemical composition, and until now, there was no instrument capable of producing high-resolution data on these minerals.
EMIT identifies different minerals through spectroscopy, or by analyzing the light reflected by the minerals. Each mineral reflects light in a slightly different way, allowing EMIT to identify each mineral like a fingerprint. Because methane also absorbs infrared light in a unique way, EMIT can detect it.
The team hopes the instrument can detect hundreds more methane hotspots around the world, allowing scientists to better understand where landmethane comes from Methane doesn’t last as long as carbon dioxide in the atmosphere – the heat-trapping gas lasts only decades compared to CO2’s centuries-long life – and climate experts say reducing methane emissions could have an effect much more immediate (relatively) in deceleration. climate warming
“We’ve been eager to see how EMIT’s mineral data will improve climate modeling,” Kate Calvin, NASA’s chief scientist and senior climate advisor, said in the statement. “This additional methane detection capability provides a remarkable opportunity for measurement and monitoring greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change”.
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