Photo: NASA
Scientists from NASA’s Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California, joined a multi-institute team of researchers June 17-27, 2011, to investigate carbon dioxide and methane gas emissions from a dry lake bed and neighbouring environment in Railroad Valley, Nevada. During the campaign, the Ames team conducted a series of flights with an unmanned aircraft system outfitted with AVIRIS, MASTER, and S-HIS instruments.
The NASA-built UAS, known as the Sensor Integrated Environmental Remote Research Aircraft (SIERRA), carried sensors to measure greenhouse gases and winds and flew at altitudes of 100-2,500 feet above ground. The SIERRA flew two measurement missions: one to determine vertical profiles of carbon dioxide over the base camp on the playa, and measurements across the playa at low altitudes, and the second to map sources of natural and biogenic methane. SIERRA, which is operated out of Ames, flew from a public airstrip at Currant Ranch, Nevada.
A modified Alpha Jet and a NASA ER-2 Earth resources aircraft, outfitted with AVIRIS, MASTER, and S-HIS instruments were also used. NASAs ER-2 high-altitude aircraft flew over Railroad Valley carrying MASTER, AVIRIS and a digital camera system at an altitude of 65,000 feet complementing data collected by the other two aircraft at lower altitudes.
The Railroad Valley Vicarious Calibration Campaign, a collaboration between the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, Calif., is an international, multi-year effort to calibrate space-based observations of carbon dioxide and methane collected by the Japanese Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite (GOSAT), using ground and airborne data. The campaign is based at Railroad Valley, on a dry lake bed, or playa, about 75 miles southwest of Ely, Nevada.
It involves more than 30 scientists and engineers from JAXA the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Colorado State University, Fort Collins and JPL. The Ames team supported the effort by providing ground and airborne measurements of carbon dioxide and methane. In addition, for the first time this year, the Ames team also investigated local sources of halophiles – organisms that live in evaporated ponds where there are extreme concentrations of salts.
“We are pleased to offer these observations to our Japanese and Jet Propulsion Laboratory colleagues in support of the important task of very precisely measuring greenhouse gases from space. We look forward to continuing to support the GOSAT team and the upcoming NASA Orbiting Carbon Observatory -2 (OCO-2) mission,” said Laura Iraci, an Earth science researcher from the Atmospheric Science Branch at Ames who planned and implemented the Ames effort.
Source: Press Release