EMIT (Survey on Earth's Surface Mineral Dust Sources) was established to help scientists understand how dust affects the climate. It can also accurately determine the emission of this powerful greenhouse gas . NASA 's Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Survey (EMIT) mission is mapping out the prevalence of critical minerals in the dust-producing deserts on Earth. This is crucial information that will help promote our understanding of the climate impact of dust in the air.
However, EMIT has demonstrated another key capability: detecting the presence of methane , a powerful greenhouse gas. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), methane captures heat in the atmosphere more than 25 times the effectiveness of carbon dioxide .
EMIT was installed on International Space Station (ISS) in July. Among the data collected later, the scientific team has identified more than 50 "super emission sources" in Central Asia, Middle East and the southwestern United States. Super emissions are facilities, equipment and other infrastructures that emit methane at particularly high rates. They are usually in the fossil fuels, wastes or agriculture sectors.
"Control methane emissions is key to limiting global warming . This exciting new development will not only help researchers better identify the source of methane leakage, but also provide insights on how to quickly resolve these issues," said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson . "The ISS and NASA's more than twenty satellites and instruments in space have long been invaluable in determining changes in Earth's climate. EMIT has proven to be an important tool in our toolbox to measure this powerful greenhouse gas -- and block it at the source."
methane absorbs infrared light in a unique pattern -- called spectral fingerprint -- and the imaging spectrometer of EMIT can be distinguished very accurately and accurately. Carbon dioxide can also be measured by this instrument.
These new observations come from the extensive coverage of the Earth by the space station orbit, and the ability of EMIT to scan areas dozens of miles wide on the Earth's surface while solving problems as small as football fields.
In the east of Hazard, Turkmenistan (a port city in Caspian Sea ), 12 strands of methane flow westward. These plume were detected by NASA's Earth's surface mineral dust source survey mission, some of which stretched over 20 miles (32 kilometers). Source: NASA/JPL-Caltech
David Thompson said: "These results are special and they demonstrate the value of pairing a global perspective with the resolution required to determine the methane point source, specifically to the facility size. This is a unique capability that will increase the standards of efforts to determine methane sources and reduce emissions from human activities." Thompson is an instrument scientist at EMIT and a senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, which manages the task.
Methane accounts for only a small part of the greenhouse gas emissions caused by humans compared to carbon dioxide, but it is estimated that methane captures heat in the atmosphere for 80 times more efficiently than carbon dioxide in the 20 years after its release. Furthermore, methane lasted for about a decade with carbon dioxide for centuries, meaning that if emissions were reduced, the atmosphere would react in a similar time frame, resulting in a slowdown in recent warming.
A stream of methane smoke plume that is at least 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) long pours into the atmosphere in southern Tehran, Iran. The plume detected by NASA's Earth's surface mineral dust source survey mission comes from a major landfill, where methane is a byproduct of decomposition. Source: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Identification of methane point sources may be a key step in this process. With knowledge of the location of emitters, operators of facilities, equipment and infrastructure that emit gases can act quickly to limit their emissions.
EMIT's methane observation was performed when scientists verify the accuracy of mineral data from imaging spectrometers.During its mission, EMIT will collect measurements of surface minerals in arid areas such as Africa, Asia, North and South America and Australia. These data will help researchers better understand the role of dust particles in the air in heating and cooling the Earth's atmosphere and surface. "We have been eager to see how EMIT's mineral data will improve climate modeling. This additional methane detection capability provides an amazing opportunity to measure and monitor greenhouse gases that cause climate change," said Kate Calvin, chief scientist and senior climate consultant at NASA. "The study area of this mission coincides with known methane hotspots in the world, allowing researchers to look for gas in these areas to test the capabilities of imaging spectrometers." "There are some of the smoke plumes detected by EMIT that are the largest ever -- unlike anything we have seen from space before. What we have found in just a short time has exceeded our expectations." The
cube (left) shows the methane plumes (purple, orange, yellow) over Turkmenistan . The rainbow color is the spectral fingerprint from the corresponding point in the previous image. The blue line (right) in the figure shows the methane fingerprint detected by EMIT; the red line is based on the expected fingerprint of atmospheric simulation. Source: NASA/JPL-Caltech
For example, the instrument detected a plume about 2 miles (3.3 km) long in the southeast of Carlsbad, New Mexico, in the Permian Basin. The Permian Basin is one of the largest oil fields in the world, spanning parts of the southeast of New Mexico and western Texas.
In Turkmenistan, EMIT discovered 12 plumes from oil and natural gas infrastructure east of the Caspian port city of Hazard. Blow westward, some plumes extend over 20 miles (32 km).
The team also identified a methane plume in southern Tehran, Iran, at least 3 miles (4.8 km) long, from a major waste treatment plant. Methane is a by-product of decomposition, and landfills may be a major source.
Scientists estimate that the flow rate of Permian sites is about 40,300 pounds (18,300 kg) per hour, the total source of Turkmenistan is 111,000 pounds (50,400 kg) per hour, while the site of Iranian is 18,700 pounds (8,500 kg) per hour.
Who is the largest methane emitter?
It is estimated that China, the United States, Russia, India, Brazilian , Indonesia, Nigeria and Mexico account for nearly half of all anthropogenic methane emissions. The main sources of methane emissions in these countries vary widely. For example, one of China's main methane emissions is coal production, while most of Russia's methane emissions come from natural gas and oil systems. The largest methane emission sources of human activity in the United States are oil and gas systems, livestock gut fermentation and landfills.
The combined flow of these sources in Turkmenistan is similar to the gas leak in Aliso Canyon in 2015, which sometimes exceeds 110,000 pounds (50,000 kg) per hour. The disaster in the Los Angeles area is one of the largest methane releases in U.S. history.
By providing extensive, repeated coverage from the vantage point of the space station, EMIT will have the potential to discover hundreds of super-transmitters – some of which have been previously discovered through air, space or ground measurements, and others are unknown.
"As EMIT continues to survey the earth, it will observe where no one thought of looking for greenhouse gas emissions before, it will find plumes that no one thought of,” said Robert Green, principal investigator at JPL.
EMIT is the first of a new class of spatial imaging spectrometers to study the Earth. One example is the Carbon Coil Flow Imager (CPM), an instrument developed at JPL to detect methane and carbon dioxide. JPL is working with Carbon Mapper, a nonprofit organization, and other partners to launch two CPM-equipped satellites by the end of 2023.
More information about missions
EMIT was selected from the Earth Risk Instrument-4 tender under the Earth Science Department of Earth Science Mission Agency and was developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which is managed by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena, California. It was launched on July 14, 2022 from NASA Kennedy Space Center in , Florida, on SpaceX Dragon Supply Spacecraft. Data from the instrument will be sent to NASA's Distributed Active Archive Center for Land Processes (DAAC) for use by other researchers and the public.
The International Space Station carries seven instruments from NASA’s Earth Sciences that provide new information to understand our ever-changing planet.
