Astrium… Climate Concerns Covered Convincingly (Satellites)

[SatNews] Astrium will contribute to the development and demonstration of a service capable of measuring…

…citywide emissions of greenhouse gases (methane, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide) as part of the CarboCountCity contract signed with Climate-KIC, worth four million euros. CarboCountCity is a project lead by Climate-KIC (Knowledge and Innovation Community), a foundation with funding from the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) and the European Commission. The first measurements will be taken in Paris over a three-year period. The project is closely linked with the greenhouse gas (GHG) monitoring service under development by Astrium Services.

CarboCountCity is one of the very first projects to measure urban GHG emissions directly. These measurements will be used to create highly accurate emissions maps for city councils and local authorities. These bodies will then be able to publish emissions reports such as those required by European legislation at a national level and, above all, assess the effectiveness of their emission reduction policies. Up to now, cities and local authorities have had access only to statistical assessments of GHG concentrations.

In measuring GHG levels in the Paris region, Astrium Services and its project partners will collate data from a network of sensors on the ground and from aerial campaigns. The measurements will then be assimilated with an atmospheric model to create emissions maps detailing the main sources and carbon sinks, with a resolution of approximately one kilometre.

The first citywide GHG measurement demonstrator was trialled by Astrium Services in London in summer 2012 and resulted in the company successfully creating emission maps, based on data from satellites, aerial measurements and from four ground sensors positioned around the city. Experience gained by Astrium Services in carrying out this trial will be applied to the service in Paris. There is a

Cities are the largest sources of CO2 emissions, according to the World Bank report “Cities and Climate Change: an urgent agenda (cf. page 15). By collating the existing data and combining it with data from satellites, new ground sensors and aerial campaigns, CarboCountCity will be able to accurately monitor urban GHG emissions, and this in turn will lead to more effective emission-reduction policies. A well-produced, informative video is available at this direct link.

Astrium has extensive expertise and operational mission experience in the field of environmental and climate satellites. Astrium is the prime contractor for Europe’s largest environmental satellite, Envisat, as well as for Cryosat-2 (ice mass detection), Aeolus (the first mission to measure wind profiles on a global scale) and EarthCARE (Earth Clouds, Aerosols and Radiation Explorer). Astrium also played a major role in designing the SMOS mission (moisture and salinity observation) and has designed and produced a full range of state-of-the-art meteorological satellites (Metop A, B and C) and payloads (Seviri instrument for Meteosat Second Generation…).

In addition, Astrium is studying MERLIN (Methane Remote Sensing Lidar Mission) the MicroCarb mission for CNES, French space agency, and the CarbonSat mission, vying to be the eighth Earth Explorer mission of European Space Agency’s Earth observation program, with the aim to assess CO2 fluxes between carbon sources and sinks and improve our knowledge of carbon sinks. Data collected by these three systems should enhance the CarboCountCity or other GHG monitoring systems. These spacecraft, instruments and systems contribute to creating a sustainable society.

Also participating in CarboCountCity are Aria Technologies, the Laboratoire des Sciences du climat et de l’Environnement, (LSCE), a joint research unit of the French Atomic Energy and Alternative Energies Commission (CEA), the University of Versailles St Quentin en Yvelines and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), and Picarro. Playing a key role in the team, Astrium Services will be responsible for defining the GHG service specifications, implementing a business plan for the marketing of this GHG measurement tool and disseminating its results to the worldwide community.