NASA Has Launched A Special Air Quality Monitor Into Earth’s Orbit
NASA launched an air quality monitoring satellite from Cape Canaveral, Florida into geostationary Earth orbit. The spacecraft was launched into orbit by a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle.
NASA said the launch was uneventful and the satellite will become operational in late May or early June. The Intelsat satellite is called the Tropospheric Emissions Monitoring of Pollution instrument (TEMPO) and is designed to monitor and collect data on the presence of smog components in the atmosphere: nitrogen dioxide, formaldehyde and ground-level ozone.
The agency expects TEMPO to help eliminate blind spots. The instrument will measure the light that gases and particles in the atmosphere reflect back into space. Scientists will be able to distinguish between different substances by unique wavelengths of light.
TEMPO is on board the Maxar Intelsat-40e communications satellite, which was launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The satellite will operate in geostationary orbit, allowing the instrument to take measurements over North America every hour. Previously, similar tools could only perform such research once a day.
TEMPO is able to track pollution over an area of 10 square meters. km. Based on the instrument’s data, US federal agencies will be able to issue more accurate air quality forecasts.
It will take several months for TEMPO readings to become available on Earth, with the instrument activated in late May or early June, after which it will be calibrated.
