EGU2020-18829
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-18829
EGU General Assembly 2020
© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Simulation of methane point source emissions and their isotopic signatures using the global/regional climate model MECO(n).

Anna-Leah Nickl1, Franziska Winterstein1, Mariano Mertens1, Astrid Kerkweg2, Alina Fiehn1, Christoph Gerbig3, Michal Galkowski3,4, and Patrick Jöckel1
Anna-Leah Nickl et al.
  • 1Institute of Atmopsheric Physics, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Wessling, Germany
  • 2Institute of Energy and Climate Research, Research Center Jülich, Jülich, Germany
  • 3Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany
  • 4AGH University of Science and Technology, Krakow, Poland

Methane is the second most important anthropogenic greenhouse gas. The globally averaged dry mole fraction has increased considerably since pre-industrial times and its growth even accelerated in 2014, with an annual rise of 12.7 ± 6 ppb. Fossil fuel emissions are one of the primary sources. However, the quantification of methane sources and sinks is still under debate and estimates of anthropogenic emissions show large uncertainties on global and regional scales. Comprehensive measurement campaigns, such as CoMet 1.0 (May-June 2018), are therefore important for assessing climate change mitigation options. CoMet aimed to quantify point source emissions in the Upper Silesian Coal Basin (USCB), where roughly 502 kt/yr of methane are emitted due to coal mining. Differences in isotopic methane source signatures δ13C and δD can further help to constrain different source contributions (e.g. thermogenic or biogenic). We simulate methane isotopologues from localized coal mine emissions in the USCB using the on-line three times nested global regional chemistry climate model MECO(n). We use a submodel extension, which includes the kinetic fractionation and make different assumptions on the isotopic source signatures in the USCB. Here we show first results of these simulations and a comparison to flask samples taken during CoMet 1.0.

How to cite: Nickl, A.-L., Winterstein, F., Mertens, M., Kerkweg, A., Fiehn, A., Gerbig, C., Galkowski, M., and Jöckel, P.: Simulation of methane point source emissions and their isotopic signatures using the global/regional climate model MECO(n)., EGU General Assembly 2020, Online, 4–8 May 2020, EGU2020-18829, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-18829, 2020

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