Jeff Bezos-supported $ 88m methane satellite missing in space

A $ 88M satellite designed to detect the release of planetary-winning gas methane from oil and gas production is lost in space in a large shock for climatic efforts.

The Methanesat satellite which was supporting Google and billionaire Jeff Bezos was only riding on an alone Musk SpaceX rocket last year.

It was to collect data for five years on sources of powerful greenhouse gas, which is responsible for about one third of human-inspired warming to help reduce the worst criminals.

The Environmental Protection Fund, the NGO, who oversees the satellite, said the communication was lost ten days ago and is currently an investigation to understand what happened.

Methane is the most powerful of greenhouse gases, and although it does not rotate in the atmosphere for a long time as carbon dioxide, it is 28 times stronger over a period of 100 years.

Despite an international commitment to reduce methane levels by 2030, it is unlikely to grow with the target year to year, which is unlikely to be completed, According to the European Space Agency.

The main sources of methane are from the decomposition of oil and gas, cultivation and food in the landfill.

But many of the current satellites that monitor it, operate privately, are less than reducing the transparency of the worst criminals for methane release.

The NGO came to Methansat after years of development by the NGO Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and publicly provided its data launched in public, allowing governments and scientists to investigate.

It was supported by a union of technical giants including Google and billionaire Jeff Bezos, which simultaneously contributed $ 88m to the project.

The devices used by the satellite are some of the world’s most sensitive, capable of taking very small sources of methane as well as “super-importers”.

Improving sensitivity is important for detecting release from agriculture that often has to spread much more than oil and gas production.

Google said that when it was launched, its project is expected to “fill the gap between the existing equipment”.

The company was using its artificial intelligence tools to process data and generate a global methane map.

But after just one year in the classroom, having a five -year program meant, the communication was lost with methansat.

The EDF team suspects that the satellite has lost power and said in a statement “It is probably not right.”

It was said that some software could be re -used, but said it would be too early to comment whether a new satellite would be launched.

“Climate challenge requires bold action and risk taking risks and it was on the major edge of satellite science, technology and advocacy,” it said.

One of other major publicly available sources of methane data is hosted by carbonmapper. One of its sources of data is the tropomi instrument that is riding in the Sentinel -5P satellite of the European Space Agency. Although it continues to send data back, its seven -year program was to end in October.

It is not clear that the greenhouse can continue collecting information, further limiting global efforts to track gas.