Mapping methane plumes at very high spatial resolution with the WorldView-3 satellite

The detection of methane emissions from industrialactivities can help enable effective climate change mitigation strategies.These industrial emissions, such as from oil and gas (O&G) extraction and coal mining, typically occur as large plumes of highly concentrated gas. Different satellite missions have recently shown the potential to map such methane plumes from space. In this work, we report on the promisingpotential of the WorldView-3 (WV-3) satellite mission for methane mapping.This relies on its unique very high spatial resolution (up to 3.7 m) data in the shortwave infrared part of the spectrum,which is complemented by a goodspectral sampling of the methane absorption feature at 2300 nm and a highsignal to noise ratio. The proposed retrieval methodology is based on thecalculation of methane concentration enhancements from pixel-wise estimatesof methane transmittance at WV-3 SWIR band 7 (2235-2285 nm), which ispositioned at a highly-sensitive methane absorption region. A sensitivityanalysis based on end-to-end simulations has helped to understand retrievalerrors and detection limits. The results have shown the good performance ofWV-3 for methane mapping, especially over bright and homogeneous areas. Thepotential of WV-3 for methane mapping has been further tested with realdata, which has led to the detection of 26 independent point emissions overdifferent methane hotspot regions, such as O&G extraction fields inAlgeria and Turkmenistan, and the Shanxi coal mining region in China. Inparticular, the detection of very small leaks (< 100 kg h(-1)) from oil pipelines in Turkmenistan shows the unique capability of WV-3 for mapping industrial methane emissions from space. The mission includes pointing capabilities that allow for a daily revisit over these oil pipelines or other critical infrastructure.

Automated summary

This study explores the potential of using the WorldView-3 satellite for methane mapping. The results show that the satellite's high spatial resolution and spectral sampling of methane absorption feature in the shortwave infrared part of the spectrum contribute to its good performance in methane mapping. Analysis of simulated data and real data further demonstrates the potential of this satellite for detecting and locating industrial methane emissions, especially in bright and homogeneous areas.