Satellite retrievals of volcanic and anthropogenic SO2 emissions

Monday, 19 March 2018: 12:00
Salon Vilaflor (Hotel Botanico)
Nickolay Anatoly Krotkov, Code 614, Greenbelt, MD, United States, Pawan K Bhartia, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, Simon A Carn, Michigan Technological University, Houghton, MI, United States, Can Li, Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, College PARK, MD, United States, Bradford L Fisher, SSAI, Greenbelt, MD, United States and Eric J Hughes, University of Maryland College Park, College Park, MD, United States
Abstract:
Sulfur Dioxide (SO2) is a short-lived gas primarily produced by volcanoes, power plants, refineries, metal smelting and burning of fossil fuels. Satellite SO2 measurements contribute to better understanding of the secondary sulfate aerosol concentrations and trends. The NASA SO2 team has a unique multiyear experience in detecting, tracking and measuring volcanic clouds and anthropogenic SO2 pollution from space (http://so2.gsfc.nasa.gov).

I will describe multi-decadal volcanic SO2 emissions climatology created by combining measurements from multiple satellites. Daily SO2 mass is retrieved by inverting satellite measured solar backscattered ultraviolet (BUV) radiances and volcanic SO2 (and aerosol) cloud altitude measurements from multiple sources, e.g., using direct altitude retrievals, lidars (CALIOP and CATS), limb-profiles, multispectral UV/IR synergy, and inverse trajectory modeling. Our team primarily uses BUV measurements from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on NASA's EOS-Aura satellite, heritage Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) on multiple satellites, and Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) on NASA-NOAA Suomi National Polar Partnership (SNPP) satellite. The OMPS combines two instruments: a nadir mapper, similar to OMI, and innovative Limb Profiler (LP). The LP with its relatively dense spatial and temporal coverage, and very high sensitivity to stratospheric aerosols, is an ideal instrument for separating sulfates directly injected by volcanoes from those produced later by SO2 to particle conversion. These primary emitted volcanic aerosols are not only important for understanding volcanic processes and stratospheric aerosol mass balance, but they also affect the vertical advection of volcanic clouds in stratosphere and interfere with SO2 retrievals from nadir BUV instruments.

I will also describe recent advances in satellite “top-down” estimates of SO2 emissions and resulted global catalogue of anthropogenic point sources. Recent OMI estimates have shown significant reductions in SO2 emissions from China, while emissions from India have been growing due to continued lack of pollution control. As a result, India is surpassing China in SO2 emissions: the observation largely unexpected by the community.

<< Previous Abstract | Next Abstract