What is the
Integrated Methane Inversion?

The Integrated Methane Inversion (IMI) is a user-friendly research-grade cloud-computing tool for estimating total methane emissions for any domain and period of interest by analytical inversion of satellite observations from the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI). It enables researchers and stakeholders to infer methane emissions at up to 0.25° × 0.3125° (≈ 25 × 25 km²) spatial resolution and up to weekly temporal resolution from TROPOMI satellite data resident on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud, without requiring expert knowledge of inverse methods or cumbersome data download.

The IMI uses the GEOS-Chem 3-D chemical transport model driven by NASA Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) meteorological data as a forward model for the inversion. It uses cutting-edge algorithms developed by the Harvard Atmospheric Chemistry Modeling Group (ACMG) in collaboration with the Netherlands Institute for Space Research (SRON) and documented extensively in the peer-reviewed research literature. It is strongly documented and fully open-code to ensure transparency, reproducibility, and integrity of the results.

An IMI preview feature allows the users to display the satellite observations for their domain and period of interest along with prior emission inventories, point source data, and expected information to be achieved from the inversion.

Integral Earth, a new simple web interface under development, will allow non-experts to access the IMI with no learning curve. Leave it to the experts at Harvard to set up and conduct your inversion, and receive complete results with full transparency of methods used.

IMI model
IMI model
IMI model

How do I Access the IMI?

The IMI is an open-source software project and freely accessible via the AWS Marketplace.

To get started with the IMI, read the documentation on the IMI readthedocs site. Instructions are provided to configure the IMI, run it on AWS, and visualize output.

What can I expect?

  • Total methane emissions in region of interest
  • Up to 25-km resolution weekly
  • Sectoral and point source identification
  • Detailed diagnostics
  • Error characterization in results

Integral Earth, a new way of accessing the IMI, is currently under development but will be released soon.

We encourage new users to email us at integrated-methane-inversion@g.harvard.edu with a description of your project. This helps us identify priorities for new features and updates.

User technical support can also be provided via this email.

Users can also submit issues via our Github repo to contribute to development.

Collaboration

The IMI is a contribution to the NASA Carbon Monitoring System and a collaboration between the Harvard Atmospheric Chemistry Modeling Group (ACMG) and the Netherlands Institute for Space Research (SRON). ACMG development of the IMI is supported in part by ExxonMobil Technology and Engineering Company. Please let us know if you are interested in supporting the IMI.