Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) have launched a new tool – the CAMS Methane Hotspot Explorer – which allows users to quickly identify major methane emissions around the world.
The tool identifies methane (CH4) plumes from a variety of sources (Coal, Oil, Gas, Urban Landfill, plus Uncategorised) and indicates how much methane is escaping in close to real-time.
The Methane Hotspot Explorer platform was developed for CAMS by SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research and leverages data from the TROPOMI instrument on the Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite. It uses advanced machine learning techniques, trained with known methane plumes, to detect new methane emissions. This combination of satellite data and machine learning allows for accurate and timely identification of methane sources.
TROPOMI offers global coverage for methane detections with a spatial resolution of 7×5.5 km². The estimated origin of methane plumes is calculated based on the most upwind point of the detection.
In Europe, most methane hotspot detections are relatively small and primarily originate from landfills, with occasional detections from coal mining. In contrast, the main sources of methane leaks globally are from oil and gas-producing countries. However, significant detections also come from landfills and coal mining, especially in Asia.
In October last year, the CAMS Methane Hotspot Explorer identified significant methane emissions in Kazakhstan, prompting the country to announce at COP29 in Baku that they had drawn up a plan to reduce non-emergency methane venting and prioritise leak detection, in co-operation with the United States.
Earlier this year the Hotspot Explorer detected a substantial methane emission from the Mount Fentale, a volcano in Ethiopia. Despite such large emissions being a rare event among volcanoes, it was estimated that methane was being emitted at a rate of 58 metric tonnes per hour.
The new tool can be accessed here.
Richard Engelen, Deputy Director of the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service, said: ‘The Methane Hotspot Explorer is a new CAMS contribution to understanding the role of human activity in the ever-growing greenhouse gas emissions scenario. It represents a significant step in the ramping up of the new Copernicus Greenhouse Gas Emissions Monitoring and Verification Support capacity (CO2MVS), which will allow us to routinely monitor anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions globally and locally using a combination of observations and Earth system modelling.’
Bram Maasakkers, a senior scientist at SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research, said: ‘Developing the instrumentation and methods to detect these methane plumes is just the first step in mitigating emissions. The launch of the Methane Explorer is a vital next step, bringing transparency of large emissions around the world to policy makers and the general public.’
Featured image: NASA