AGES+ Coordinating Activities

Aircraft: NASA GV and GIII

Synergistic TEMPO Air Quality Science (STAQS)

Science Objectives

To accelerate NASA's Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of POllution (TEMPO) mission science soon after launch, the Synergistic TEMPO Air Quality Science (STAQS) mission seeks to integrate TEMPO satellite observations with traditional air quality monitoring to improve understanding of air quality science and increase societal benefit. STAQS will be conducted in summer 2023, targeting three primary domains in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City with ground and airborne based measurements. The framework for STAQS stems from measurements strategies and collaborations developed during airborne air quality studies from the last decade, most recently TRacking Aerosol Convection ExpeRiment - Air Quality (TRACER-AQ). For STAQS, NASA is collaborating with the other scientific field studies listed within this section to build a synergistic observing system more robust than any singular entity could provide alone.

Objectives of STAQS include, but are not limited to:

Evaluating TEMPO level 2 products geo-physically, spatially, and temporally
Interpreting the temporal and spatial evolution of air quality events tracked by TEMPO
Improving temporal estimates of anthropogenic, biogenic, and greenhouse gas emissions
Assessing the benefit of assimilating TEMPO data into chemical transport models
Linking air quality patterns to socio-demographic data

Deployment Location, Calendar, and Payload

annual average TROPOMI NO2 column density measurements map — Map of the annual average TROPOMI NO₂ column density measurements for April 2018 - March 2019 showing the currently planned primary (white circles) sampling domains during STAQS within the TEMPO field of regard (black outline).

STAQS flights will coincide with AEROMMA flights by targeting New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles as the main targets during the same time frame in July - August 2023. Over the course of summer 2023, up to 120 science flight hours on the NASA JSC GV will be flown to collect data with the GeoCAPE Airborne Spectrometer (GCAS) and High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL)-2 + Differential Optical Absorption Ozone. This payload was first demonstrated on this platform during the TRACER-AQ mission in September 2021 and provides repeated high-resolution mapping of NO₂, HCHO, ozone, and aerosols as an airborne proxy for TEMPO. Additionally, NASA will deploy the NASA LaRC GIII with the High-Altitude Lidar Observatory (HALO) and Airborne Visible InfraRed Imaging Spectrometer - Next Generation (AVIRIS-NG) to provide a complementary view of methane and carbon dioxide. STAQS support also include the deployment of a suite of TOLNet lidars to multiple locations.

Confirmed instruments of the STAQS NASA GV and GIII aircraft deployments

Species Measured on the Gulfstream aircraft	Technique	PI	Institution
NO₂, HCHO columns	GeoCAPE Airborne Spectrometer (GCAS)	Scott Janz	NASA GSFC
Aerosol and ozone profiles	High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL)-2	John Hair	NASA LARC
Methane columns and aerosol profiles	High Altitude Lidar Observatory (HALO)	Amin Nehrir	NASA LARC
Methane and carbon dioxide emissions	Airborne Visible InfraRed Imaging Spectrometer - Next Generation (AVIRIS-NG)	Robert Green	NASA JPL