High-resolution assessment of coal mining methane emissions by satellite in Shanxi, China

Shushi Peng; Clément Giron; Gang Liu; Alexandre d'Aspremont; Antoine Benoit; Thomas Lauvaux; Xin Lin; Hugo de Almeida Rodrigues; Marielle Saunois; Philippe Ciais

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.108375

High-resolution assessment of coal mining methane emissions by satellite in Shanxi, China

iScience. 2023 Nov 2;26(12):108375. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2023.108375. eCollection 2023 Dec 15.

Authors

Shushi Peng¹, Clément Giron², Gang Liu¹, Alexandre d'Aspremont^{2

3}, Antoine Benoit², Thomas Lauvaux⁴, Xin Lin⁴, Hugo de Almeida Rodrigues², Marielle Saunois⁴, Philippe Ciais^{4

5}

Affiliations

¹ Sino-French Institute for Earth System Science, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, and Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes, Peking University, Beijing, China.
² Kayrros, 33 rue Lafayette, 75009 Paris, France.
³ CNRS & DI, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, France.
⁴ Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement, LSCE/IPSL, CEA-CNRS-UVSQ, Université Paris-Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France.
⁵ The Cyprus Institute, 20 Konstantinou Kavafi Street, 2121 Nicosia, Cyprus.

Abstract

Accurate assessment of coal mine methane (CMM) emissions is a prerequisite for defining baselines and assessing the effectiveness of mitigation measures. Such an endeavor is jeopardized, however, by large uncertainties in current CMM estimates. Here, we assimilated atmospheric methane column concentrations observed by the TROPOMI space borne instrument in a high-resolution regional inversion to estimate CMM emissions in Shanxi, a province representing 15% of the global coal production. The emissions are estimated to be 8.5 ± 0.6 and 8.6 ± 0.6 Tg CH₄ yr^-1 in 2019 and 2020, respectively, close to upper bound of current bottom-up estimates. Data from more than a thousand of individual mines indicate that our estimated emission factors increase significantly with coal mining depth at prefecture level, suggesting that ongoing deeper mining will increase CMM emission intensity. Our results show robustness of estimating CMM emissions utilizing TROPOMI images and highlight potential of monitoring methane leakages and emissions from satellites.

Keywords: Atmospheric chemistry; Atmospheric observation; Atmospheric science.