The GReenhouse gas And Air Pollutants Emissions System (GRA2PES) is a joint activity between NOAA's Chemical Sciences Laboratory and NIST's Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Measurements Program which aims to enhance the US Government’s capability to model and map GHG and air pollutant emissions and their associated uncertainties across the continental United States. A primary focus of this joint research effort is to enhance the reliability of underlying data products to better serve the needs of researchers and stakeholders in both the traditional air quality and GHG mitigation communities.
This capability currently utilizes publicly accessible GHG emissions activity data from multiple economic sectors, including energy production, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, and land use, among others. The initiative involves the development of "bottom-up" emission data and uncertainty evaluation at spatial and temporal resolutions relevant to both improving air quality and mitigating GHG emissions including at city, state, and regional levels. In the future, GRA2PES will also combine atmospheric air pollutant and GHG observations from various atmospheric measurement platforms along with meteorological observations and models to evaluate and refine emission information and uncertainties.
The GRA2PES initiative aims to identify areas where improving data and models would most help us understand GHG emissions. By combining different types of emissions information and using statistical techniques, we can assess the accuracy of the estimates. Collaborating with other organizations working on similar projects, such as the UK's National Physical Laboratory and the EU's Environment Agency, can be mutually beneficial.
For further information, download the GRA2PES White Paper
Currently, GRA2PES provides emissions for the year 2021 at 4 km x 4 km spatial resolution with year, month, day-of-week, and diurnal temporal information. Specifically, GRA2PES utilizes datasets from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and leverages a few well evaluated inventories for specific sectors, including the Fuel-based Oil and Gas (FOG) inventory, the Fuel-based Inventory of Vehicle Emissions (FIVE), and the Volatile Chemical Products (VCP) inventory. Additional years will be added in the future. For a technical explanation of the data see the ReadMe file.
Congmeng Lyu, Colin Harkins, Meng Li, Brian McDonald, Jack Prothero, Kimberly Mueller, The U.S. Greenhouse Gas and Air Pollutant Emissions System (GRA2PES), National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), doi:10.18434/mds2-3520, 2024.
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McDonald, B.C., J.A. de Gouw, J.B. Gilman, S.H. Jathar, A. Akherati, C.D. Cappa, J.L. Jimenez, J. Lee-Taylor, P.L. Hayes, S.A. McKeen, Y.Y. Cui, S.-W. Kim, D.R. Gentner, G. Isaacman-VanWertz, A.H. Goldstein, R.A. Harley, G.J. Frost, J.M. Roberts, T.B. Ryerson, and M. Trainer, Volatile chemical products emerging as largest petrochemical source of urban organic emissions, Science, doi:10.1126/science.aaq0524, 2018.