NASA Maps 50 Methane 'Super-emitters' Using ISS Dust Sensor

upstart writes:

NASA maps 50 methane 'super-emitters' using ISS dust sensor:

Instruments installed on the International Space Station to examine Earth's atmospheric dust have been found to have another useful purpose: detecting airborne methane plumes contributing to greenhouse gas emissions.

NASA's Earth surface Mineral dust source InvesTigation (EMIT ... seriously?) mission was installed on the ISS in July to measure mineral dust in Earth's atmosphere. America's space boffins have found the equipment can also track methane emissions and since then has managed to identify 50 "super emitters," usually operations in the fossil fuel, waste, and agricultural sectors that emit methane at high rates, around the world.

"It turns out that methane also has a spectral signature in the same wavelength range [of the instrument], and that's what has allowed us to be sensitive to methane," EMIT principal investigator Robert Green, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) said at a press conference this week.

[...] Pointed at Earth, a spectrograph such as EMIT is able to do lots of stuff, such as study dust plumes, which NASA said also have the ability to cool or warm the planet. EMIT is focusing on figuring out which dusty regions of Earth are rich in iron particles or clay dust, which have the tendency to trap and repel heat, respectively. With that knowledge, NASA hopes to learn more about dust's effect on climate change.

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