NASA TEMPO mission (Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution), what with 2023 the year measures air quality from geostationary orbit at height 35,000 km, successfully completed her 20-month basic program. Due to the high quality of the data, the project has been officially extended until at least September 2026 year.
TEMPO is NASA's first mission, which uses a spectrometer to continuously collect hourly daytime air pollution data over North America. It can record in detail changes in air quality in areas of only a few square kilometers — this is a significant breakthrough compared to previous satellite missions.
TEMPO measures nitrogen dioxide content (NO₂) and formaldehyde (HCHO), which allows determining the concentration of surface ozone. Example, 2 August 2024 TEMPO recorded abnormally high ozone levels over Houston, associated with emissions from petrochemical enterprises in the industrial area of the city.
The satellite also detects other pollution, caused by smog, forest fires, dust storms, transport and power plants. TEMPO records traces of gases in the troposphere, including ozone, nitrogen dioxide and formaldehyde.
An important milestone was the testing of data delivery in less than three hours after observations. This allows timely warning of the public about dangerous levels of air pollution.
TEMPO was NASA's first mission, that exceeded 2 petabytes (2 millions of gigabytes) data downloads in one year. Close 800 unique users are mainly meteorologists, academics and health researchers—actively use this data to make predictions, research and assessment of the impact of pollution.
Images from the TEMPO mission illustrate the application of the technology in various regions of the United States. Example, the satellite detected NO₂, which originated from fires in the Oklahoma prairies, and identified sources of smoke, distinguishing them from dust storms. TEMPO also recorded emissions over Minnesota, associated with the use of fertilizers and mining activities.
TEMPO is a joint initiative of NASA and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (Harvard & Smithsonian), which manages the instrument's daily operations and data processing. Partner agencies, except NOAA, use TEMPO data to create additional aerosol products, which help distinguish smoke and dust particles by height and density.
TEMPO is part of NASA's Earth Venture Instrument program and is part of the virtual constellation of air quality monitoring satellites in the Northern Hemisphere, along with South Korea's GEMS and Europe's Sentinel-4. The TEMPO device was created by BAE Systems (Previously Ball Aerospace) and it is mounted on Maxar Technologies' Intelsat 40e satellite.
Source: https://www.nasa.gov/missions/tempo/nasa-mission-monitoring-air-quality-from-space-extended/