CO2 concentrations in the air continue to rise rapidly, and a rapid reduction in man-made emissions is becoming increasingly important.
In order to assess the effectiveness of political measures, timely and reliable emission levels are needed. However, current methods are costly. The European Space Agency ESA is therefore working on the development of new satellites which will be able to determine CO2 emissions in the future - with the help of Empa.
Cities are veritable CO2 sources, but how much emission is actually emitted can hardly be reliably determined at present. Current estimates are based on statistics and activity data from transport, industry, heating and energy production. The evaluation of these data is complex and the results are only available with a long delay. Estimates are also uncertain, as precise figures are often not available and simplified assumptions must be made - for example, in the case of heating. Although the current network of ground stations is useful for tracking the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere, it is not currently dense enough to provide reliable information on the emissions of individual countries or even individual cities.
Continue reading at Empa Materials Science and Technology
Image via Empa Materials Science and Technology
