{"id":756,"date":"2020-04-07T16:02:40","date_gmt":"2020-04-07T15:02:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cimafoundation.org\/2020\/04\/14\/a-satellite-eye-nitrogen-dioxide-monitoring\/"},"modified":"2022-09-29T08:19:09","modified_gmt":"2022-09-29T08:19:09","slug":"a-satellite-eye-nitrogen-dioxide-monitoring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/news\/a-satellite-eye-nitrogen-dioxide-monitoring\/","title":{"rendered":"A satellite eye: nitrogen dioxide monitoring"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><em>CIMA Research Foundation researchers used the data provided by the ESA Sentinel-5P satellite to produce maps of nitrogen dioxide concentration trends, one of the most toxic air pollutants<\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">From space, satellites can give us a lot of\ninformation about what is happening on our planet. For example, they can help\nin the assessment of the impact and extent of natural disasters, such as floods\nor forest fires, by providing data on climate, hydrology, built infrastructure,\netc. Satellites can also be used to analyze air pollution and the concentration\nof gases that are toxic to humans and contribute to the greenhouse effect. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Researchers in our <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Earth Observation Department (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/foundations\/research-development\/earth-observation.html\" target=\"_blank\">Earth Observation Department<\/a> have started working on analyzing satellite data provided by the European Space Agency <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" aria-label=\"Sentinel-5P (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/www.esa.int\/Applications\/Observing_the_Earth\/Copernicus\/Sentinel-5P\/Introducing_Sentinel-5P\" target=\"_blank\">Sentinel-5P<\/a> to produce daily maps that monitor NO<sub>2<\/sub> (nitrogen dioxide) concentrations over time. NO<sub>2 <\/sub>is an irritant agent, one of the most toxic to humans, that is \u201clargely produced by anthropogenic activities, such as the combustion of biomass and fossil fuels\u201d, explains Elisabetta Fiori, one of the department\u2019s researchers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Analyzing the concentrations of pollutants, such as\nnitrogen dioxide, and their variations in space and time allows for a better\nunderstanding of their dynamics and the factors that influence them.&nbsp; To do so, satellites are an invaluable\nresource. Sentinel-5P is equipped with a sensor, called TROPOMI (TROPOspheric\nMonitoring Instrument), which uses passive remote sensing techniques to achieve\nits objective by measuring, in the upper part of the atmosphere, the solar\nradiation reflected and radiated from the earth. It is thus able to provide\nmeasurements in ultraviolet, visible, near infrared, and partly in real\ninfrared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Some of the data acquired by Sentinel-5P was used by\nour researchers for a short video, which we can be found here. It shows the\ntrend of nitrogen dioxide concentration in Italy between the first days of December\n2019 and March 19, 2020. \u201cThese images tell us daily the distribution of NO<sub>2<\/sub>,\ncalculated with a weighted average of the previous ten days: in short, we can\nobserve the trend of the concentration even a few days away from today and\nevaluate the variations\u201d, Fiori concludes. \u201cThis information will help us to\nmonitor air quality, to identify the areas most at risk and also possibly evaluate\nthe possible effects, in terms of air pollution, of the nationwide lockdown\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure><iframe src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/405069607\" width=\"640\" height=\"454\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/figure>\n<div style=\"font-size:13px; margin-bottom: 1.5em;text-align: center;margin-top: -20px;color: #555d66;width: 100%;\">The NO2 monitoring from December 10, 2019 to March 19, 2020<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CIMA Research Foundation researchers used the data provided by the ESA Sentinel-5P satellite to produce maps of nitrogen dioxide concentration trends, one of the most toxic air pollutants From space, satellites can give us a lot of information about what is happening on our planet. For example, they can help in the assessment of the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":942,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[127,12],"tags":[87],"class_list":["post-756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-earth-observation","category-uncategorized","tag-italy"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cimafoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}