Ground-based Remote Sensing of Total Columnar CO2, CH4, and CO using EM27/SUN FTIR spectrometer at a suburban location in India and validation of Sentinel-5p/TROPOMI

Abstract

Greenhouse gasses (GHGs) play an important role in controlling local air pollution as well as climate change. In the present study, we retrieved column-averaged dry-air (X) mole fractions of carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), and carbon monoxide (CO) using a ground-based EM27/SUN Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometer (FTIR). The EM27/SUN spectrometers are widely in use in the COllaborative Carbon Column Observing Network (COCCON). The PROFFAST software provided by COCCON has been used to analyze the measured atmospheric solar absorption spectra. In this paper, the diurnal variation and the time series of daily averaged XCO2, XCH4, and XCO covering the period December 2020 to May 2021 are analyzed. The maximum values of XCO2, XCH4, and XCO are observed to be 420.57 ppm, 1.93 ppm, and 170.40 ppb respectively. Less diurnal (XCO2 ~0.44 ppm; XCH4=0.004 ppm, and XCO=4.84 ppb) but clear seasonal changes are observed during the study period. The XCH4 and XCO from the Sentinel-5Precursor (S5P)/TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) are compared against the EM27/SUN retrievals. The correlation coefficient ‘r’ between the EM27/SUN retrieved XCH4 and XCO against S5P/TROPOMI are 0.75 and 0.94 respectively.