HR: 0800h
AN: A11C-0072    [Abstracts]
TI: Estimation of fire emissions from satellite-based measurements
AU: * Ichoku, C M
EM: ichoku@climate.gsfc.nasa.gov
AF: NASA/GSFC (SSAI), Code 913, Greenbelt, MD 20771 United States
AU: Kaufman, Y J
EM: Yoram.J.Kaufman@nasa.gov
AF: NASA/GSFC, Code 913, Greenbelt, MD 20771 United States
AB: Biomass burning is a worldwide phenomenon affecting many vegetated parts of the globe regularly. Fires emit large quantities of aerosol and trace gases into the atmosphere, thus influencing the atmospheric chemistry and climate. Traditional methods of fire emissions estimation achieved only limited success, because they were based on peripheral information such as rainfall patterns, vegetation types and changes, agricultural practices, and surface ozone concentrations. During the last several years, rapid developments in satellite remote sensing has allowed more direct estimation of smoke emissions using remotely-sensed fire data. However, current methods use fire pixel counts or burned areas, thereby depending on the accuracy of independent estimations of the biomass fuel loadings, combustion efficiency, and emission factors. With the enhanced radiometric range of its 4-micron fire channel, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor, which flies aboard both of the Earth Observing System (EOS) Terra and Aqua Satellites, is able to measure the rate of release of fire radiative energy (FRE) in MJ/s (something that older sensors could not do). MODIS also measures aerosol distribution. Taking advantage of these new resources, we have developed a procedure combining MODIS fire and aerosol products to derive FRE-based smoke emission coefficients (Ce in kg/MJ) for different regions of the globe. These coefficients are simply used to multiply FRE from MODIS to derive the emitted smoke aerosol mass. Results from this novel methodology are very encouraging. For instance, it was found that the smoke total particulate mass emission coefficient for the Brazilian Cerrado ecosystem (approximately 0.022 kg/MJ) is about twice the value for North America or Australia, but about 50 percent lower than the value for Zambia in southern Africa.
DE: 1610 Atmosphere (0315, 0325)
DE: 1640 Remote sensing
DE: 0305 Aerosols and particles (0345, 4801)
SC: Atmospheric Sciences [A]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting