Comparing satellite methane measurements to inventory estimates: a Canadian case study
File(s)1-s2.0-S2590162122000521-main.pdf (3.94 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Dubey, Luke
Cooper, Jasmin
Staffell, Iain
Hawkes, Adam
Balcombe, Paul
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Methane emissions from natural gas production are of increasing importance as they threaten efforts to mitigate climate change. Current inventory estimates carry high uncertainties due to difficulties in measuring emission sources across large regions. Satellite measurements of atmospheric methane could provide new understanding of emissions. This paper provides insight into the effectiveness of using satellite data to inform and improve methane inventories for natural gas activities. TROPOMI data are used to quantify methane emissions from natural gas within the Montney basin region of Canada and results are compared with existing inventories. Emissions estimated using TROPOMI data were 2.6 ± 2.2 kt/day which is 7.4 ± 6.4 times the inventory estimates. Pixels (7 by 7 km) that contained gas facilities had on average 11 ppb more methane than the background. 7.4% of pixels containing gas sites displayed consistently high methane levels that were not reflected in the inventory. The satellite data were not sufficiently granular to correlate with inventories on a facility scale. This illustrates the spatial limitations of using satellite data to corroborate bottom-up inventories.
Date Issued
2023-01
Date Acceptance
2022-11-30
Citation
Atmospheric Environment: X, 2023, 17, pp.1-9
ISSN
2590-1621
Publisher
Elsevier
Start Page
1
End Page
9
Journal / Book Title
Atmospheric Environment: X
Volume
17
Copyright Statement
© 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Identifier
https://www.webofscience.com/api/gateway?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000900024800001&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=a2bf6146997ec60c407a63945d4e92bb
Subjects
EMISSIONS
Environmental Sciences
Environmental Sciences & Ecology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences
Methane emissions
Natural gas
NATURAL-GAS
OIL
Physical Sciences
Satellite data
Science & Technology
TROPOMI
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
100198
Date Publish Online
2022-12-10