{ "id": 3554, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/3554/", "page_type": "Visualization", "title": "Aqua/AIRS Sees Belt of Carbon Dioxide in Southern Hemisphere", "description": "Although originally designed to measure atmospheric water vapor and temperature profiles for weather forecasting, data from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua spacecraft are now also being used by scientists to observe atmospheric carbon dioxide. In the southern hemisphere, a belt of mid-tropospheric air containing enhanced concentrations of carbon dioxide emerged between 30 and 40 degrees south latitude. This belt had not previously been seen in any chemistry transport model. Subtropical storms track through this region, as do the cloud bands of the intertropical convergence zone near the equator, an area of low atmospheric pressure that forms where northeast and southeast trade winds meet.The researchers believe strong convection (thunderstorms) in this belt, and South America's high Andes Mountains, lift carbon dioxide from major sources on Earth's surface, such as the respiration of plants, forest fires and facilities for producing synthetic fuels and generating power. This carbon dioxide is then carried into the 'free troposphere,' the part of the troposphere that is too high to be influenced by Earth's surface. There, it becomes trapped in the mid-latitude jet stream, which transports it rapidly around the world. For more information on AIRS, visit the AIRS Project Web Site: http://airs.jpl.nasa.gov. The AIRS data products are available at http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/AIRS/index.shtml. || ", "release_date": "2008-10-07T16:00:00-04:00", "update_date": "2023-05-03T13:55:03.447897-04:00", "main_image": { "id": 501888, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003500/a003554/SouthernHemisphereBelt_AfricaCoalLiquidation.0700.jpg", "filename": "SouthernHemisphereBelt_AfricaCoalLiquidation.0700.jpg", "media_type": "Image", "alt_text": "In the 1950's, the South African government decided to produce gasoline and chemicals from their plentiful natural supply of coal. The South African Coal liquidation plant also exports carbon dioxide. This image shows AIRS carbon dioxide data from July 2003.", "width": 3840, "height": 2160, "pixels": 8294400 }, "main_video": { "id": 501883, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003500/a003554/CO2SouthernHemisphereBelt.mp4", "filename": "CO2SouthernHemisphereBelt.mp4", "media_type": "Movie", "alt_text": "In the 1950's, the South African government decided to produce gasoline and chemicals from their plentiful natural supply of coal. The South African Coal liquidation plant also exports carbon dioxide. This image shows AIRS carbon dioxide data from July 2003.", "width": 1280, "height": 720, "pixels": 921600 }, "main_credits": { "Visualizations by": [ { "name": "Lori Perkins", "employer": "NASA/GSFC" } ] }, "progress": "Complete", "media_groups": [ { "id": 355499, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/3554/#media_group_355499", "widget": "Basic text with HTML", "title": "", "caption": "", "description": "Although originally designed to measure atmospheric water vapor and temperature profiles for weather forecasting, data from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument on NASA's Aqua spacecraft are now also being used by scientists to observe atmospheric carbon dioxide. In the southern hemisphere, a belt of mid-tropospheric air containing enhanced concentrations of carbon dioxide emerged between 30 and 40 degrees south latitude. This belt had not previously been seen in any chemistry transport model. Subtropical storms track through this region, as do the cloud bands of the intertropical convergence zone near the equator, an area of low atmospheric pressure that forms where northeast and southeast trade winds meet.

The researchers believe strong convection (thunderstorms) in this belt, and South America's high Andes Mountains, lift carbon dioxide from major sources on Earth's surface, such as the respiration of plants, forest fires and facilities for producing synthetic fuels and generating power. This carbon dioxide is then carried into the 'free troposphere,' the part of the troposphere that is too high to be influenced by Earth's surface. There, it becomes trapped in the mid-latitude jet stream, which transports it rapidly around the world.

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But they also saw a dominant feature that was wholly unexpected. A continuous belt of higher carbon dioxide concentrations circled an area in the Southern Hemisphere that covered the tip of South America, Africa and southern Australia. Computer models that predict how chemicals move throughout the atmosphere did not predict this band. Scientists now think that strong thunderstorms and winds that flow around South America's high Andes Mountains lift carbon dioxide into what's called the \"free troposphere.\" There it becomes trapped in the jet stream of the mid-latitudes, which propel it around the world. The sources of this belt are many: industry and power plants in coal-rich South Africa, electricity generation in eastern Australia and in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as well as plant respiration and fires. Watch the visualization below to see the first evidence of the belt, as detected by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument aboard NASA's Aqua satellite in 2003. AIRS now provides scientists with unprecedented global data on greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. || ", "release_date": "2011-12-08T00:00:00-05:00", "update_date": "2023-05-03T13:53:23.964015-04:00", "main_image": { "id": 482702, "url": "https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a010000/a010800/a010854/SouthAmericaBioMass0950_cover_1024x576.jpg", "filename": "SouthAmericaBioMass0950_cover_1024x576.jpg", "media_type": "Image", "alt_text": "Researchers discovered a previously unknown band of carbon dioxide pollution encircling the Southern Hemisphere.", "width": 1024, "height": 576, "pixels": 589824 } } ], "sources": [], "products": [], "newer_versions": [], "older_versions": [], "alternate_versions": [] }