Climate Trace Aims to Put Greenhouse Gas Emission Readings in the Public Domain
Climate Trace, an organization launched in 2019 and backed by Google, is seeking to gather greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, manufacturing facilities, large transportation vessels, forest fires, and anything else imaginable, and upload it into the public domain. The data would be captured by satellite, sensor, and machine learning technology, and made available in real time.
Overview of Climate Trace
Climate Trace consists of a group of non-profits including Carbon Tracker, WattTime, CarbonPlan, Earthrise Alliance, Hudson Carbon, OceanMind and Rocky Mountain Institute, as well as several technology companies including Blue Sky Analytics and Hypervine.
The coalition was awarded a $1.7 million grant from Google to track emissions using satellite technology. The process, in a nutshell, is to combine imagery of smoke emitting into the atmosphere with heat imaging and nitrogen oxide sensor data, and analyze and quantify it via machine learning.
This approach is far more accurate and transparent than the current method that encompasses a mix of disparate monitoring mechanisms and self-reporting methods. The self-reporting aspect in particular is troublesome, because, like any survey, there is always going to be a difference between what people say and what they do.
In addition, the satellite technology proposed by Climate Trace will provide real-time data. Current self-reporting surveys and similar approaches typically collect data once a year, which means that it is not comprehensive and can be outdated by the time it is analyzed.
As of the time of this writing, the coalition only has a prototype of its data collection tool and methodology availiable. The group plans to release its first global report in the summer of 2021. Expectations are that the results should continuously improve over time as more data is captured and additional algorithm improvements are developed.
Overall, this sounds like a great idea, because its main objective is to combat climate change, which is creating more weather volatility – and power outages – over time. Climate Trace should in theory help detect illegal polluters, help monitor compliance with climate change agreements, and help companies make better decisions in terms of reducing their carbon footprint. And all of these objectives look good to me when viewed through an emergency preparedness lens.
