University of Bremen: Research flights over Canada with Bremen participation
Oil and gas production, coal mining, landfills, agriculture, wetlands and thawing permafrost all produce the greenhouse gas methane. But which source how much? For the answer, the research aircraft HALO was now in use over Canada – with researchers from the University of Bremen.
“Methane in the earth’s atmosphere is considered to be one of the most important greenhouse gases, but its natural and man-made sources are still poorly understood,” explains Dr. Heinrich Bovensmann from the Institute for Environmental Physics at the University of Bremen. To bring light into the darkness, the University of Bremen is involved in the CoMet 2.0 Arctic (Carbon dioxide and methane mission for HALO) project. It is managed by the German Aerospace Center (DLR). Other partners are the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena and the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. “Using Canada as an example, we want to record greenhouse gas emissions more precisely and comprehensively and use the data to improve climate forecasts,” says Bovensmann, outlining the goal.
Lots of methane from coal mines, landfills and oil sands
In August and September 2022, the researchers from the University of Bremen successfully tested their novel instrument MAMAP2D Light for imaging methane from local sources. High concentrations of methane have been imaged particularly over open coal mines in the Rocky Mountains, over landfills and over the Athabasca Oil Sands.
In addition to the instrument from the University of Bremen, a lidar measuring device from DLR, a hyperspectral instrument from the Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) in Munich and measuring instruments from the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena were also on board. The measurements by the research aircraft HALO were supplemented by measurements by Canadian and American colleagues on land and in the air as part of an international collaboration. In the coming months, it will now be a question of evaluating and analyzing the measurement data obtained.
About HALO
The research aircraft HALO (High Altitude and Long Range) is a joint initiative of German research institutions. HALO is funded by grants from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the German Research Foundation (DFG), the Helmholtz Association, the Max Planck Society (MPG), the Leibniz Association, the Free State of Bavaria, the Karlsruhe Institute for Technologie (KIT), the Research Center Jülich and the German Aerospace Center (DLR).