Comment on egusphere-2026-313
Abstract
Abstract. Robust estimates of methane emissions are critical for understanding their impacts on atmospheric warming and air quality, and for assessing methane mitigation strategies. Gridded inventories, such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Greenhouse Gas Inventory (EPA GHGI), the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR 2024), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fossil Fuel Oil and Gas inventory (NOAA FOG), are constructed to evaluate large-scale emission patterns and support identifying emission mitigation priorities and prioritizing future measurements. However, substantial differences across inventories complicate such assessments. We benchmark EPA GHGI, EDGAR 2024, and NOAA FOG against flux estimates from an atmospheric inversion of Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite (GOSAT) data from 2012 to 2020 over the Contiguous United States (CONUS). A key technical challenge is the heterogeneous sensitivity of satellite-derived fluxes, which depends on measurement uncertainty, coverage, and inversion model configuration. We account for this heterogeneity by applying an inversion operator to each inventory prior to comparison with the GOSAT-based estimates. The GOSAT estimates are most sensitive to oil&gas and livestock emissions; oil and gas emissions are consistent with NOAA FOG (14.1 Tg CH4 yr⁻¹ in 2015), but exceed EPA GHGI and EDGAR, particularly across Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. GOSAT-based livestock emissions exceed EPA GHGI and EDGAR by 1–2 Tg CH4 yr⁻¹, with the largest differences in the Midwest and California. Despite these discrepancies, both activity and satellite based estimates show no observable trends from 2012 to 2020 in fossil and livestock emissions.
Authors 14
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John R. Worden corresponding
California Institute of Technology · Jet Propulsion Laboratory · University of California, Los Angeles
Affiliation as printed
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, United States
Joint Institute for Regional Earth System Science and Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States
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Sudhanshu Pandey corresponding
California Institute of Technology · Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Affiliation as printed
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, United States
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California Institute of Technology · Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Affiliation as printed
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, United States
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California Institute of Technology · Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Affiliation as printed
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, United States
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Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences · University of Colorado Boulder · NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory
Affiliation as printed
Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, Colorado, United States
NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, Colorado, United States
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Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences · University of Colorado Boulder · NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory
Affiliation as printed
Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, Colorado, United States
NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, Colorado, United States
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Space Research Organisation Netherlands
Affiliation as printed
SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Leiden, The Netherlands
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Affiliation as printed
Rocky Mountain Institute, Boulder, Colorado, United States
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Affiliation as printed
Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
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Affiliation as printed
Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
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Harvard University · Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Affiliation as printed
Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
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Affiliation as printed
Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
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Affiliation as printed
Rocky Mountain Institute, Boulder, Colorado, United States
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North Carolina State University
Affiliation as printed
North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina, United States
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