Articles | Volume 22, issue 23
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-15351-2022
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-15351-2022
Research article
 | Highlight paper
 | 
05 Dec 2022
Research article | Highlight paper |  | 05 Dec 2022

Estimating emissions of methane consistent with atmospheric measurements of methane and δ13C of methane

Sourish Basu, Xin Lan, Edward Dlugokencky, Sylvia Michel, Stefan Schwietzke, John B. Miller, Lori Bruhwiler, Youmi Oh, Pieter P. Tans, Francesco Apadula, Luciana V. Gatti, Armin Jordan, Jaroslaw Necki, Motoki Sasakawa, Shinji Morimoto, Tatiana Di Iorio, Haeyoung Lee, Jgor Arduini, and Giovanni Manca

Related authors

Can ∆14CO2 observations help atmospheric inversions constrain the fossil CO2 emission budget of Europe?
Carlos Gómez-Ortiz, Guillaume Monteil, Sourish Basu, and Marko Scholze
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2023-2215,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2023-2215, 2023
Short summary
National CO2 budgets (2015–2020) inferred from atmospheric CO2 observations in support of the global stocktake
Brendan Byrne, David F. Baker, Sourish Basu, Michael Bertolacci, Kevin W. Bowman, Dustin Carroll, Abhishek Chatterjee, Frédéric Chevallier, Philippe Ciais, Noel Cressie, David Crisp, Sean Crowell, Feng Deng, Zhu Deng, Nicholas M. Deutscher, Manvendra K. Dubey, Sha Feng, Omaira E. García, David W. T. Griffith, Benedikt Herkommer, Lei Hu, Andrew R. Jacobson, Rajesh Janardanan, Sujong Jeong, Matthew S. Johnson, Dylan B. A. Jones, Rigel Kivi, Junjie Liu, Zhiqiang Liu, Shamil Maksyutov, John B. Miller, Scot M. Miller, Isamu Morino, Justus Notholt, Tomohiro Oda, Christopher W. O'Dell, Young-Suk Oh, Hirofumi Ohyama, Prabir K. Patra, Hélène Peiro, Christof Petri, Sajeev Philip, David F. Pollard, Benjamin Poulter, Marine Remaud, Andrew Schuh, Mahesh K. Sha, Kei Shiomi, Kimberly Strong, Colm Sweeney, Yao Té, Hanqin Tian, Voltaire A. Velazco, Mihalis Vrekoussis, Thorsten Warneke, John R. Worden, Debra Wunch, Yuanzhi Yao, Jeongmin Yun, Andrew Zammit-Mangion, and Ning Zeng
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 963–1004, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-963-2023,https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-963-2023, 2023
Short summary
Sixteen years of MOPITT satellite data strongly constrain Amazon CO fire emissions
Stijn Naus, Lucas G. Domingues, Maarten Krol, Ingrid T. Luijkx, Luciana V. Gatti, John B. Miller, Emanuel Gloor, Sourish Basu, Caio Correia, Gerbrand Koren, Helen M. Worden, Johannes Flemming, Gabrielle Pétron, and Wouter Peters
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 14735–14750, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-14735-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-14735-2022, 2022
Short summary
Multi-year observations reveal a larger than expected autumn respiration signal across northeast Eurasia
Brendan Byrne, Junjie Liu, Yonghong Yi, Abhishek Chatterjee, Sourish Basu, Rui Cheng, Russell Doughty, Frédéric Chevallier, Kevin W. Bowman, Nicholas C. Parazoo, David Crisp, Xing Li, Jingfeng Xiao, Stephen Sitch, Bertrand Guenet, Feng Deng, Matthew S. Johnson, Sajeev Philip, Patrick C. McGuire, and Charles E. Miller
Biogeosciences, 19, 4779–4799, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-4779-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-4779-2022, 2022
Short summary
Four years of global carbon cycle observed from the Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2 (OCO-2) version 9 and in situ data and comparison to OCO-2 version 7
Hélène Peiro, Sean Crowell, Andrew Schuh, David F. Baker, Chris O'Dell, Andrew R. Jacobson, Frédéric Chevallier, Junjie Liu, Annmarie Eldering, David Crisp, Feng Deng, Brad Weir, Sourish Basu, Matthew S. Johnson, Sajeev Philip, and Ian Baker
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 1097–1130, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-1097-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-1097-2022, 2022
Short summary

Related subject area

Subject: Isotopes | Research Activity: Atmospheric Modelling and Data Analysis | Altitude Range: Troposphere | Science Focus: Physics (physical properties and processes)
Disentangling the impact of air–sea interaction and boundary layer cloud formation on stable water isotope signals in the warm sector of a Southern Ocean cyclone
Iris Thurnherr and Franziska Aemisegger
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 10353–10373, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-10353-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-10353-2022, 2022
Short summary
Stable water isotope signals in tropical ice clouds in the West African monsoon simulated with a regional convection-permitting model
Andries Jan de Vries, Franziska Aemisegger, Stephan Pfahl, and Heini Wernli
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 8863–8895, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-8863-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-8863-2022, 2022
Short summary
Disentangling different moisture transport pathways over the eastern subtropical North Atlantic using multi-platform isotope observations and high-resolution numerical modelling
Fabienne Dahinden, Franziska Aemisegger, Heini Wernli, Matthias Schneider, Christopher J. Diekmann, Benjamin Ertl, Peter Knippertz, Martin Werner, and Stephan Pfahl
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 16319–16347, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-16319-2021,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-16319-2021, 2021
Short summary
Firewood residential heating – local versus remote influence on the aerosol burden
Clara Betancourt, Christoph Küppers, Tammarat Piansawan, Uta Sager, Andrea B. Hoyer, Heinz Kaminski, Gerhard Rapp, Astrid C. John, Miriam Küpper, Ulrich Quass, Thomas Kuhlbusch, Jochen Rudolph, Astrid Kiendler-Scharr, and Iulia Gensch
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 5953–5964, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-5953-2021,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-5953-2021, 2021
Short summary
Controls on the water vapor isotopic composition near the surface of tropical oceans and role of boundary layer mixing processes
Camille Risi, Joseph Galewsky, Gilles Reverdin, and Florent Brient
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 12235–12260, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-12235-2019,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-12235-2019, 2019
Short summary

Cited articles

Allan, W., Struthers, H., and Lowe, D. C.: Methane Carbon Isotope Effects Caused by Atomic Chlorine in the Marine Boundary Layer: Global Model Results Compared with Southern Hemisphere Measurements, J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 112, D04306, https://doi.org/10.1029/2006JD007369, 2007. a, b
Andrews, A. E., Kofler, J. D., Trudeau, M. E., Williams, J. C., Neff, D. H., Masarie, K. A., Chao, D. Y., Kitzis, D. R., Novelli, P. C., Zhao, C. L., Dlugokencky, E. J., Lang, P. M., Crotwell, M. J., Fischer, M. L., Parker, M. J., Lee, J. T., Baumann, D. D., Desai, A. R., Stanier, C. O., De Wekker, S. F. J., Wolfe, D. E., Munger, J. W., and Tans, P. P.: CO2, CO, and CH4 measurements from tall towers in the NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory's Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network: instrumentation, uncertainty analysis, and recommendations for future high-accuracy greenhouse gas monitoring efforts, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 7, 647–687, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-7-647-2014, 2014. a
Basu, S., Guerlet, S., Butz, A., Houweling, S., Hasekamp, O., Aben, I., Krummel, P., Steele, P., Langenfelds, R., Torn, M., Biraud, S., Stephens, B., Andrews, A., and Worthy, D.: Global CO2 fluxes estimated from GOSAT retrievals of total column CO2, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 8695–8717, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-13-8695-2013, 2013. a
Basu, S., Krol, M., Butz, A., Clerbaux, C., Sawa, Y., Machida, T., Matsueda, H., Frankenberg, C., Hasekamp, O. P., and Aben, I.: The Seasonal Variation of the CO2 Flux over Tropical Asia Estimated from GOSAT, CONTRAIL, and IASI, Geophys. Res. Lett., 41, 1809–1815, https://doi.org/10.1002/2013GL059105, 2014. a
Basu, S., Miller, J. B., and Lehman, S.: Separation of biospheric and fossil fuel fluxes of CO2 by atmospheric inversion of CO2 and 14CO2 measurements: Observation System Simulations, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 5665–5683, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-5665-2016, 2016. a, b
Download
Executive editor
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas and an important sink of atmospheric OH radicals, which determine the global atmospheric oxidation capacity. CH4 has increased since pre-industrial times until the year 2000, after which its global concentration has remained relatively stable. Since 2007, it is rapidly increasing again for reasons that are not well understood. The current paper analyses source specific methane emissions that are likely responsible for the recent increase. Global CH4 sources are determined using variational inversion based on measurements of methane and its isotope signatures (δ13C). This latter provide better constraints on the contributions of microbial and fossil fuel CH4 sources than the concentrations alone. The analysis points to a more strongly increasing contribution of microbial sources since 2007 than predicted by previous assessments (Global Carbon Project). These findings have the potential to lead to a major reassessment of the global methane budget.
Short summary
Atmospheric methane (CH4) has been growing steadily since 2007 for reasons that are not well understood. Here we determine sources of methane using a technique informed by atmospheric measurements of CH4 and its isotopologue 13CH4. Measurements of 13CH4 provide for better separation of microbial, fossil, and fire sources of methane than CH4 measurements alone. Compared to previous assessments such as the Global Carbon Project, we find a larger microbial contribution to the post-2007 increase.
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint