The satellite projects are a mix of public and private efforts that vary from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel-5 Precursor satellite to Montreal-based GHGSat Inc., which plans a constellation of satellites. ESA, whose craft launched in 2017, released a global map of methane offering insights into where the gas originated. The new satellites can detect invisible bands of the light spectrum, allowing for the identification of gases such as methane and carbon dioxide.
“Seeing exactly who is emitting what, where, how much and when is a must in order to reduce emissions and stop climate change,” said Yotam Ariel, the founder of Bluefield Technologies Inc., which plans to have its first gas-measuring microsatellite in orbit by the end of next year.
Satellite Startups
Bluefield is one of several startups entering the sector, including GHGSat and San Francisco-based Orbital Sidekick Inc. that will launch satellites and sensors to monitor leaks at oil and gas facilities. Bluefield is funded in part by Village Global LP, a venture capital firm backed by tech titans including Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg. GHGSat’s investors include the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, Schlumberger Ltd., Space Angels and the Business Development Bank of Canada.
The new crop of satellites have yet to demonstrate the accuracy required to monitor emissions from natural sources like wetlands, or the agricultural sector, but may be useful in helping identify and reduce large point source emissions, according to Lesley Ott, a research meteorologist at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
“We are in the process of building a data store of emissions from all facilities globally,” said Stephane Germain, president of GHGSat, which aims to have a dozen emissions-monitoring satellites in orbit in the next three years. “Our ambition is to understand carbon dioxide and methane emissions from every single one of those facilities and track them over time.”
The cost to launch a 5-kilogram cubesat into low Earth orbit is as little as $295,000, according to the website of Seattle-based Spaceflight Inc. Final costs can fluctuate depending on the orbit, timeframe, launch vehicle and other factors.
Other efforts, like the EDF’s MethaneSAT, will seek to capture changes on more regional levels. Typically, satellites that scan wider swaths of the Earth offer lower resolution than those with more precise measurements, that usually have a narrower field of vision.
Tracking greenhouse gases by satellite is still in its infancy and its important to combine the data with ground-based calculations, according to Sentinel-5 Precursor Mission Manager Claus Zehner. Even clouds and air pollution can distort measurements, he said.
“The future is to combine different satellite measurements in space together with ground-based measurements and with models,” said Zehner. “You need all those components.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.