Evaluating atmospheric methane inversion model results for Pallas, northern Finland

A state-of-the-art inverse model, CarbonTracker Data Assimilation Shell (CTDAS), was used to optimize estimates of methane (CH4) surface fluxes using atmospheric observations of CH4 as a constraint. The model consists of the latest version of the TM5 atmospheric chemistry-transport model and an ense...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Tsuruta, Aki, Aalto, Tuula, Backman, Leif, Peters, Wouter, Krol, Maarten, van der Laan-Luijkx, Ingrid T., Hatakka, Juha, Heikkinen, Pauli, Dlugokencky, Edward J., Spahni, Renato, Paramonova, Nina N.
Other Authors: Marine and Atmospheric Research
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: 2015
Subjects:
CH4
CO2
AIR
Online Access:https://dspace.library.uu.nl/handle/1874/326999
Description
Summary:A state-of-the-art inverse model, CarbonTracker Data Assimilation Shell (CTDAS), was used to optimize estimates of methane (CH4) surface fluxes using atmospheric observations of CH4 as a constraint. The model consists of the latest version of the TM5 atmospheric chemistry-transport model and an ensemble Kalman filter based data assimilation system. The model was constrained by atmospheric methane surface concentrations, obtained from the World Data Centre for Greenhouse Gases (WDCGG). Prior methane emissions were specified for five sources: biosphere, anthropogenic, fire, termites and ocean, of which biosphere and anthropogenic emissions were optimized. Atmospheric CH4 mole fractions for 2007 from northern Finland calculated from prior and optimized emissions were compared with observations. It was found that the root mean squared errors of the posterior estimates were more than halved. Furthermore, inclusion of NOAA observations of CH, from weekly discrete air samples collected at Pallas improved agreement between posterior CH4 mole fraction estimates and continuous observations, and resulted in reducing optimized biosphere emissions and their uncertainties in northern Finland.