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- Title
Quantifying fossil fuel methane emissions using observations of atmospheric ethane and an uncertain emission ratio.
- Authors
Ramsden, Alice E.; Ganesan, Anita L.; Western, Luke M.; Rigby, Matthew; Manning, Alistair J.; Foulds, Amy; France, James L.; Barker, Patrick; Levy, Peter; Say, Daniel; Wisher, Adam; Arnold, Tim; Rennick, Chris; Stanley, Kieran M.; Young, Dickon; O'Doherty, Simon
- Abstract
We present a method for estimating fossil fuel methane emissions using observations of methane and ethane, accounting for uncertainty in their emission ratio. The ethane:methane emission ratio is incorporated as a variable parameter in a Bayesian model, with its own prior distribution and uncertainty. We find that using an emission ratio distribution mitigates bias from using a fixed, potentially incorrect emission ratio and that uncertainty in this ratio is propagated into posterior estimates of 5 emissions. A synthetic data test is used to show the impact of assuming an incorrect ethane:methane emission ratio and demonstrate how our variable parameter model can better quantify overall uncertainty. We also use this method to estimate UK methane emissions from high-frequency observations of methane and ethane from the UK Deriving Emissions linked to Climate Change (DECC) network. Using the joint methane-ethane inverse model, we estimate annual mean UK methane emissions of approximately 0.27 (95% uncertainty interval 0.26-0.29) Tg y-1 from fossil fuel sources and 2.06 (1.99-2.15) 10 Tg y-1 from non-fossil fuel sources, during the period 2015-2019. Uncertainties in UK fossil fuel emissions estimates are reduced on average by 15%, and up to 35%, when incorporating ethane into the inverse model, in comparison to results from the methane-only inversion.
- Subjects
UNITED Kingdom; METHANE as fuel; FOSSIL fuels; ETHANES; METHANE; CLIMATE change; UNCERTAINTY
- Publication
Atmospheric Chemistry & Physics Discussions, 2021, p1
- ISSN
1680-7367
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.5194/acp-2021-734