Identification

Title

Emissions of CH₄ and N₂O over the United States and Canada based on a receptor-oriented modeling framework and COBRA-NA atmospheric observations

Abstract

We present top-down emission constraints for two non-CO₂ greenhouse gases in large areas of the U.S. and southern Canada during early summer. Collocated airborne measurements of methane and nitrous oxide acquired during the COBRA-NA campaign in May - June 2003, analyzed using a receptor-oriented Lagrangian particle dispersion model, provide robust validation of independent bottom-up emission estimates from the EDGAR and GEIA inventories. We find that the EDGAR CH₄ emission rates are slightly low by a factor of 1.08 ± 0.15 (2σ), while both EDGAR and GEIA N₂O emissions are significantly too low, by factors of 2.62 ± 0.50 and 3.05 ± 0.61, respectively, for this region. Potential footprint bias may expand the statistically retrieved uncertainties. Seasonality of agricultural N₂O emissions may help explain the discrepancy. Total anthropogenic U.S. and Canadian emissions would be 49 Tg CH₄ and 4.3 Tg N₂O annually, if these inventory scaling factors applied to all of North America.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d70c4vzb

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2008-09-26T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Copyright 2008 American Geophysical Union.

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata date

2025-07-17T15:56:03.518979

Metadata language

eng; USA