Satellites will be used to track global carbon emissions

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Scientists are to investigate how to reduce global warming - with help from two new satellites.

Researchers at Edinburgh University will study data from the instruments, which will measure CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The satellites are being launched by Nasa and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency and will give region-by-region accounts of Earth’s carbon emissions and highlight areas of the planet absorbing the most CO2.

The vessels, known as the Orbiting Carbon Observatory and the Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite, will provide fresh information on surface emissions and CO2 absorption, taking in remote regions such as the Amazon basin, Siberian taiga, Alaskan tundra and African forests.

Currently, scientists are able to look at CO2 emissions from very small areas, such as cities, or very large areas, like oceans. This latest technique could potentially help to quantify the emissions outputs of individual countries.

This will allow scientists to pinpoint more accurately the worst-polluting regions on Earth. The satellites will also identify more effectively those environmental conditions which encourage absorption of CO2, such as those found in forests and oceans.

Recreating these conditions naturally or artificially elsewhere on Earth could help to curb emissions in the Earth’s atmosphere. Paul Palmer, of Edinburgh University’s School of GeoSciences, said the satellites would be effective in tackling climate change.

He said: “This development is unprecedented. We expect to learn where and how much CO2 is released to the atmosphere and how much is absorbed by forests and oceans, and how it moves around in the atmosphere.

“All of this will help us look for ways of combating climate change on Earth.”

In the longer term, data from the satellites could contribute to the development of a better accounting system for carbon trading, the scheme in which countries are assigned an individual limit on how much CO2 they can emit, and can sell any surplus.