The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America Mission

Kenneth J. Davis; Edward V. Browell; Sha Feng; Thomas Lauvaux; Michael D. Obland; Sandip Pal; Bianca C. Baier; David F. Baker; Ian T. Baker; Zachary R. Barkley; Kevin W. Bowman; Yu Yan Cui; A. Scott Denning; Joshua P. Digangi; Jeremy T. Dobler; Alan Fried; Tobias Gerken; Klaus Keller; Bing Lin; Amin R. Nehrir; Caroline P. Normile; Christopher W. O'Dell; Lesley E. Ott; Anke Roiger; Andrew E. Schuh; Colm Sweeney; Yaxing Wei; Brad Weir; Ming Xue; Christopher A. Williams

doi:10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1

The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America Mission

Kenneth J. Davis, Edward V. Browell, Sha Feng, Thomas Lauvaux, Michael D. Obland, Sandip Pal, Bianca C. Baier, David F. Baker, Ian T. Baker, Zachary R. Barkley, Kevin W. Bowman, Yu Yan Cui, A. Scott Denning, Joshua P. Digangi, Jeremy T. Dobler, Alan Fried, Tobias Gerken, Klaus Keller, Bing Lin, Amin R. NehrirCaroline P. Normile, Christopher W. O'Dell, Lesley E. Ott, Anke Roiger, Andrew E. Schuh, Colm Sweeney, Yaxing Wei, Brad Weir, Ming Xue, Christopher A. Williams

Remote Sensing & Environmental Informati

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Abstract

The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America NASA Earth Venture Suborbital Mission set out to improve regional atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) inversions by exploring the intersection of the strong GHG fluxes and vigorous atmospheric transport that occurs within the midlatitudes. Two research aircraft instrumented with remote and in situ sensors to measure GHG mole fractions, associated trace gases, and atmospheric state variables collected 1,140.7 flight hours of research data, distributed across 305 individual aircraft sorties, coordinated within 121 research flight days, and spanning five 6-week seasonal flight campaigns in the central and eastern United States. Flights sampled 31 synoptic sequences, including fair-weather and frontal conditions, at altitudes ranging from the atmospheric boundary layer to the upper free troposphere. The observations were complemented with global and regional GHG flux and transport model ensembles. We found that midlatitude weather systems contain large spatial gradients in GHG mole fractions, in patterns that were consistent as a function of season and altitude. We attribute these patterns to a combination of regional terrestrial fluxes and inflow from the continental boundaries. These observations, when segregated according to altitude and air mass, provide a variety of quantitative insights into the realism of regional CO2 and CH4 fluxes and atmospheric GHG transport realizations. The ACT-America dataset and ensemble modeling methods provide benchmarks for the development of atmospheric inversion systems. As global and regional atmo spheric inversions incorporate ACT-America's findings and methods, we anticipate these systems will produce increasingly accurate and precise subcontinental GHG flux estimates.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	E1714-E1734
Journal	Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
Volume	102
Issue number	9
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1
State	Published - Sep 2021

Funding

Acknowledgments. The ACT-America project is a NASA Earth Venture Suborbital 2 project funded by NASA’s Earth Science Division. Authors were supported by the following NASA grants: NNX15AG76G to Penn State (Davis); NNX15AJ06G (Baier, Sweeney) and NNX15AW47G (Fried) to University of Colorado Boulder; NNX16AN17G to Clark University (Williams); NNL15AQ00B to Exelis (Dobler); 80NSSC19K0730 to Texas Tech and a Texas Tech University start-up research grant (Pal); NNX15AI97G (O’Dell), NNX15AJ07G (D. Baker, Schuh), NNX15AJ09G (Denning), and 80NSSC20K0924 (I. Baker) to Colorado State University; NNX17AG11G (Xue) to the University of Oklahoma. Additional support for research was provided by NASA Grants NNX12AP90G (Davis), NNX14AJ17G (Davis), NNX14AL32H (Normile), and NNX13AP34G (Lauvaux). Complementary support for tower-based measurements was provided by NASA Grant NNX14AJ17G and NIST Grant 70NANB15H336. The ORNL DAAC is sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration under Interagency Agreement 80GSFC19T0039. ORNL participation in ACT-America was funded by Interagency Agreement NNL15AA10I. NASA coauthors were supported by NASA Science Mission Directorate funding awarded in response to the Earth Venture Suborbital-2 Announcement of Opportunity NNH13ZDA001N-EVS2. Roiger was supported by DLR VO-R via the young investigator research group “Greenhouse Gases.” T. Lauvaux was supported by the French research program Make Our Planet Great Again (Project CIUDAD). Part of the research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004).

Keywords

Biosphere-atmosphere interaction
Boundary layer
Carbon cycle
Greenhouse gases
Inverse methods
Synoptic-scale processes

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10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1

Cite this

Davis, K. J., Browell, E. V., Feng, S., Lauvaux, T., Obland, M. D., Pal, S., Baier, B. C., Baker, D. F., Baker, I. T., Barkley, Z. R., Bowman, K. W., Cui, Y. Y., Denning, A. S., Digangi, J. P., Dobler, J. T., Fried, A., Gerken, T., Keller, K., Lin, B., ... Williams, C. A. (2021). The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America Mission. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 102(9), E1714-E1734. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1

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abstract = "The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America NASA Earth Venture Suborbital Mission set out to improve regional atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) inversions by exploring the intersection of the strong GHG fluxes and vigorous atmospheric transport that occurs within the midlatitudes. Two research aircraft instrumented with remote and in situ sensors to measure GHG mole fractions, associated trace gases, and atmospheric state variables collected 1,140.7 flight hours of research data, distributed across 305 individual aircraft sorties, coordinated within 121 research flight days, and spanning five 6-week seasonal flight campaigns in the central and eastern United States. Flights sampled 31 synoptic sequences, including fair-weather and frontal conditions, at altitudes ranging from the atmospheric boundary layer to the upper free troposphere. The observations were complemented with global and regional GHG flux and transport model ensembles. We found that midlatitude weather systems contain large spatial gradients in GHG mole fractions, in patterns that were consistent as a function of season and altitude. We attribute these patterns to a combination of regional terrestrial fluxes and inflow from the continental boundaries. These observations, when segregated according to altitude and air mass, provide a variety of quantitative insights into the realism of regional CO2 and CH4 fluxes and atmospheric GHG transport realizations. The ACT-America dataset and ensemble modeling methods provide benchmarks for the development of atmospheric inversion systems. As global and regional atmo spheric inversions incorporate ACT-America's findings and methods, we anticipate these systems will produce increasingly accurate and precise subcontinental GHG flux estimates.",

keywords = "Biosphere-atmosphere interaction, Boundary layer, Carbon cycle, Greenhouse gases, Inverse methods, Synoptic-scale processes",

author = "Davis, {Kenneth J.} and Browell, {Edward V.} and Sha Feng and Thomas Lauvaux and Obland, {Michael D.} and Sandip Pal and Baier, {Bianca C.} and Baker, {David F.} and Baker, {Ian T.} and Barkley, {Zachary R.} and Bowman, {Kevin W.} and Cui, {Yu Yan} and Denning, {A. Scott} and Digangi, {Joshua P.} and Dobler, {Jeremy T.} and Alan Fried and Tobias Gerken and Klaus Keller and Bing Lin and Nehrir, {Amin R.} and Normile, {Caroline P.} and O'Dell, {Christopher W.} and Ott, {Lesley E.} and Anke Roiger and Schuh, {Andrew E.} and Colm Sweeney and Yaxing Wei and Brad Weir and Ming Xue and Williams, {Christopher A.}",

note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright}2021 American Meteorological Society For information regarding reuse of this content and general copyright information, consult the AMS Copyright Policy.",

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doi = "10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1",

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Davis, KJ, Browell, EV, Feng, S, Lauvaux, T, Obland, MD, Pal, S, Baier, BC, Baker, DF, Baker, IT, Barkley, ZR, Bowman, KW, Cui, YY, Denning, AS, Digangi, JP, Dobler, JT, Fried, A, Gerken, T, Keller, K, Lin, B, Nehrir, AR, Normile, CP, O'Dell, CW, Ott, LE, Roiger, A, Schuh, AE, Sweeney, C, Wei, Y, Weir, B, Xue, M & Williams, CA 2021, 'The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America Mission', Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, vol. 102, no. 9, pp. E1714-E1734. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1

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AU - Browell, Edward V.

AU - Feng, Sha

AU - Lauvaux, Thomas

AU - Obland, Michael D.

AU - Pal, Sandip

AU - Baier, Bianca C.

AU - Baker, David F.

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AU - Barkley, Zachary R.

AU - Bowman, Kevin W.

AU - Cui, Yu Yan

AU - Denning, A. Scott

AU - Digangi, Joshua P.

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AU - Lin, Bing

AU - Nehrir, Amin R.

AU - Normile, Caroline P.

AU - O'Dell, Christopher W.

AU - Ott, Lesley E.

AU - Roiger, Anke

AU - Schuh, Andrew E.

AU - Sweeney, Colm

AU - Wei, Yaxing

AU - Weir, Brad

AU - Xue, Ming

AU - Williams, Christopher A.

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N2 - The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America NASA Earth Venture Suborbital Mission set out to improve regional atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) inversions by exploring the intersection of the strong GHG fluxes and vigorous atmospheric transport that occurs within the midlatitudes. Two research aircraft instrumented with remote and in situ sensors to measure GHG mole fractions, associated trace gases, and atmospheric state variables collected 1,140.7 flight hours of research data, distributed across 305 individual aircraft sorties, coordinated within 121 research flight days, and spanning five 6-week seasonal flight campaigns in the central and eastern United States. Flights sampled 31 synoptic sequences, including fair-weather and frontal conditions, at altitudes ranging from the atmospheric boundary layer to the upper free troposphere. The observations were complemented with global and regional GHG flux and transport model ensembles. We found that midlatitude weather systems contain large spatial gradients in GHG mole fractions, in patterns that were consistent as a function of season and altitude. We attribute these patterns to a combination of regional terrestrial fluxes and inflow from the continental boundaries. These observations, when segregated according to altitude and air mass, provide a variety of quantitative insights into the realism of regional CO2 and CH4 fluxes and atmospheric GHG transport realizations. The ACT-America dataset and ensemble modeling methods provide benchmarks for the development of atmospheric inversion systems. As global and regional atmo spheric inversions incorporate ACT-America's findings and methods, we anticipate these systems will produce increasingly accurate and precise subcontinental GHG flux estimates.

AB - The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America NASA Earth Venture Suborbital Mission set out to improve regional atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) inversions by exploring the intersection of the strong GHG fluxes and vigorous atmospheric transport that occurs within the midlatitudes. Two research aircraft instrumented with remote and in situ sensors to measure GHG mole fractions, associated trace gases, and atmospheric state variables collected 1,140.7 flight hours of research data, distributed across 305 individual aircraft sorties, coordinated within 121 research flight days, and spanning five 6-week seasonal flight campaigns in the central and eastern United States. Flights sampled 31 synoptic sequences, including fair-weather and frontal conditions, at altitudes ranging from the atmospheric boundary layer to the upper free troposphere. The observations were complemented with global and regional GHG flux and transport model ensembles. We found that midlatitude weather systems contain large spatial gradients in GHG mole fractions, in patterns that were consistent as a function of season and altitude. We attribute these patterns to a combination of regional terrestrial fluxes and inflow from the continental boundaries. These observations, when segregated according to altitude and air mass, provide a variety of quantitative insights into the realism of regional CO2 and CH4 fluxes and atmospheric GHG transport realizations. The ACT-America dataset and ensemble modeling methods provide benchmarks for the development of atmospheric inversion systems. As global and regional atmo spheric inversions incorporate ACT-America's findings and methods, we anticipate these systems will produce increasingly accurate and precise subcontinental GHG flux estimates.

KW - Biosphere-atmosphere interaction

KW - Boundary layer

KW - Carbon cycle

KW - Greenhouse gases

KW - Inverse methods

KW - Synoptic-scale processes

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DO - 10.1175/BAMS-D-20-0300.1

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JO - Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

JF - Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

IS - 9

ER -

The Atmospheric Carbon and Transport (ACT)-America Mission

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