The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that successfully launched from Florida on Friday carried a NASA device to track air pollution above North America.
The
Tropospheric Emissions Monitoring of Pollution (TEMPO) instrument will
allow NASA scientists to track air pollutants and their sources from
space with greater precision and frequency than previous
pollution-tracking satellites.
- NASA posted a video showing that the TEMPO satellite had successfully detached from the Falcon rocket in space.
- Kevin
Daugherty, the project manager for TEMPO, said that the tool will be
able to measure air quality on an hourly basis during the daytime "from
Puerto Rico up to the tar sands of Canada."
- TEMPO will be housed on an Intelsat communications satellite in geostationary orbit.
- Current
pollution-monitoring satellites are all in low Earth orbit, meaning
that they can only provide observation data once a day.
- TEMPO
will be able to measure atmospheric pollution down to a spatial
resolution of 4 miles, measure levels of different pollutants,
and provide air quality forecasts.
- NASA Administrator Bill
Nelson said that the TEMPO mission "is about more than just studying
pollution — it's about improving life on Earth for all."
