Hamburg 2009 – scientific programme

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UP: Fachverband Umweltphysik

UP 9: Methoden II

UP 9.1: Invited Talk

Thursday, March 5, 2009, 16:30–17:00, VMP 8 R206

Sensing methane, carbon dioxide and water vapour isotopologues from space - Results from SCIAMACHY onboard ENVISAT — •Christian Frankenberg — Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Utrecht

Methane is, after Carbon dioxide, the second most important anthropogenic greenhouse gas. SCIAMACHY from its vantage point in space offers the unique opportunity to measure methane concentrations globally with high sensitivity towards the surface. Previous investigations of SCIAMACHY-observed methane received much attention since they pointed to grossly underestimated emissions in the tropics. Until then, tropical methane emissions were speculated to be very important but were weakly constrained in absence of suitable measurements. We will present an overview of the findings so far and report new results from a revised retrieval version using updated spectroscopic parameters. We will present how satellite measurements can be used to invert sources by means of a four-dimensional variational (4D-Var) data assimilation system. Further, we will give an overview of the latest status of Carbon Dioxide retrievals from different research groups using SCIAMACHY and a short outlook of the potential of the OCO and GOSAT satellites to be launched in January 2009. In addition, we will show latest results of retrievals of deuterated water vapour from SCIAMACHY spectra and how it can be used to gain information on hydrological cycles and processes determining isotope fractionations.