The US space agency (NASA) has sent to the International Space Station (ISS) a new scientific instrument that will help monitor carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of our planet, both in terms of emission and subsequent partial absorption by the Earth. The Orbiting Carbon Observatory, or OCO-3, was launched by Florida on Saturday on a Falcon rocket fired by Space X.
The new $ 110 million observatories were assembled from the other parts of a satellite, OCO-2, which was launched in 2014 for the same reason. The data from the two observatories will give scientists a clearer picture of the motion of the dioxide in the atmosphere.
The OCO-2 is powered by a solar-modern polar orbit, which allows it to monitor a location only at the same time of day, while the OCO-3 on the ISS will “see” the same locations at many different times of the day, something very useful, as e.g. the ability of plants to absorb dioxide changes over the course of 24 hours. In addition, the OCO-3 will cover an area of about 6,400 square kilometers, 16 times larger than that of the OCO-2.
Today, human activities emit nearly 40 billion tons of carbon dioxide each year, mainly through the combustion of fossil fuels. About half of this amount remains in the atmosphere, gradually deteriorating climate change, while the rest is absorbed by the Earth’s plants and oceans.
The OCO-3 will be installed outside the Japanese section of the ISS and is scheduled to operate for three years, according to the BBC and Nature. In the future, other observatories will be added to “map” atmospheric dioxide, such as European Sentinel satellites.
Source: Internet
