Let’s Investigate Methane for Climate Action

2025 started with the launch of the H-Europe project IM⁴CA to enhance the quantification and understanding of methane emissions and sinks. A consortium of 25 partners joins forces to investigate pressing questions about the evolution atmospheric methane levels in recent decades, to reduce the uncertainty in future projections and design efficient solutions for monitoring and mitigating emissions in and outside of Europe. It will build new measurement and modelling infrastructure for improved monitoring of the progress toward short- and long-term emission reduction targets, with a prominent role for existing and upcoming satellite missions for measuring atmospheric composition and land surface properties.

The changing European methane emissions are an important focus of the project, which we keep track of with help of eastward extensions of the ICOS monitoring network in Poland and Romania. Intensive measurement campaigns in Rumania are conducted combining surface, aircraft, and total column measurements to improve the accuracy of emission quantification techniques using satellite data. The world-wide applicability of these techniques will extend the impact of our campaigns far beyond European borders.

Besides changing anthropogenic emissions, climate impacts on natural sources and sinks of methane are an important focus of IM⁴CA also. The four-year research program will initiate new measurement infrastructure in Congo to help characterize emissions from tropical wetlands in Africa. Campaigns will be conducted in Northern Scandinavia along a transect of disappearing permafrost to investigate impacts on vegetation and methane emissions using techniques that can be applied to high-resolution satellite instruments for circumpolar emission mapping.

This presentation will provide an overview of the planned activities and goals of IM⁴CA. The project offers a great opportunity to learn about methane in a cooperative spirit and to reach out and provide support to those who can turn knowledge about methane into climate action.