Periodic Reporting for period 2 - CoCO2 (Prototype system for a Copernicus CO2 service)
Reporting period: 2022-01-01 to 2023-12-31
To support EU countries in assessing their progress for reaching their targets agreed in the Paris Agreement, the European Commission clearly stated that a way to monitor anthropogenic CO2 emissions is needed. Such a capacity would deliver consistent and reliable information to support policy- and decision-making processes. To maintain Europe’s independence in this domain, it is imperative that the EU establishes an observation-based operational anthropogenic CO2 emissions Monitoring and Verification Support (CO2MVS) capacity as part of its Copernicus programme. The CoCO2 Coordination and Support Action was intended as a continuation of the CO2 Human Emissions (CHE) project, led by ECMWF. The main objective of CoCO2 was to perform R&D activities identified as a need in the CHE project and strongly recommended by the European Commission's CO2 monitoring Task Force. The activities sustained the development of a European capacity for monitoring anthropogenic CO2 emissions. The activities addressed all components of the system, such as atmospheric transport models, re-analysis, data assimilation techniques, bottom-up estimation, in-situ networks, and ancillary measurements needed to address the attribution of CO2 emissions. The aim was to have prototype systems at the required spatial scales ready by the end of the project as input for the foreseen Copernicus CO2 service element.
CoCO2 worked on all the elements of the planned CO2MVS capacity, including in-situ observations, prior emission information, global and local modelling and data assimilation, uncertainties, integration, prototype products, and user engagement. Some of the highlights include the following:
• Global and regional high-resolution bottom-up anthropogenic fossil fuel emission estimates of CO2 and co-emitted species per sector for the years 2018 and 2021 as well as biogenic fluxes for land and ocean, together with improved temporal and vertical profiles and novel estimates of the important lateral fluxes were provided.
• Significant developments of the global component of the CO2MVS, which will be based on the 4D-Var data assimilation system of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System (IFS). This resulted in two one-year long nature runs at high resolution that can be used as input to inverse modelling studies.
• Improved and partly new approaches and tools as well as a series of conclusions and recommendations for plume detection and estimation methodologies that can be used with future satellite sensors, such as CO2M.
• Significant progress in support of better estimating the uncertainties in the CO2MVS capacity, including an Ensemble of Data Assimilation (EDA) configuration for the IFS, the extension of the VERIFY Community Inversion Framework (CIF) to include more (inverse) models and used for a study on transport errors, and a new flux measurement-based evaluation toolbox was implemented in such a way that it can remain available beyond the CoCO2 project.
• The submission of a report to the UNFCCC 1st Global Stocktake (GST) summarising the data from some of the CoCO2 prototype systems, supported by more detailed documentation, the production of national Fact Sheets for 2021 following the methodology and workflow from the VERIFY project, and design ideas for an Evaluation and Quality Control (EQC) system building on existing approaches in the CAMS operational service, on the experience from the CoCO2 project, and on the experience gained in the atmospheric inversion community in general.
• Several documents describing the requirements and availability of in situ observations, including a gap analysis and data pipeline document.
• Three synthesis reports of consistent estimates of emissions of CO2 and CH4, building on the previous VERIFY work, but focusing on global scale and top-10 emitters to provide (potential) users with examples of reconciliations of GHG estimates between inventories and bottom-up and top-down observation-based emissions to form the basis of a future GST supporting process.
• Two User Consultation Workshop organised in collaboration with ICLEI to engage sub-national entities and other local stakeholders in the process of product development of the new CO2MVS capacity.
• A draft Decision Support Blueprint in support of the implementation of an adequate user interface in CAMS.
• Continual interactions with the CO2 Task Force and the CO2M MAG, the WMO/IG3IS Steering Committee, CEOS Task Force meetings, the GCOS Implementation Plan, and provision of relevant input to the WMO Implementation Plan for a Global Greenhouse Gas Watch programme.
The project results have been shown at many conferences, workshops, and other meetings, including COP26, COP27, and COP28. Finally, a presentation day was organised in December 2022 and a General Assembly in November 2023 to show progress to the various stakeholder groups. The GA also included a dedicated session on user engagement with national inventory agencies, to which also some other related projects contributed. All public document deliverables are available on the CoCO2 website and datasets are as much as possible published on public data stores.
• Global and regional high-resolution bottom-up anthropogenic fossil fuel emission estimates of CO2 and co-emitted species per sector for the years 2018 and 2021 as well as biogenic fluxes for land and ocean, together with improved temporal and vertical profiles and novel estimates of the important lateral fluxes were provided.
• Significant developments of the global component of the CO2MVS, which will be based on the 4D-Var data assimilation system of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System (IFS). This resulted in two one-year long nature runs at high resolution that can be used as input to inverse modelling studies.
• Improved and partly new approaches and tools as well as a series of conclusions and recommendations for plume detection and estimation methodologies that can be used with future satellite sensors, such as CO2M.
• Significant progress in support of better estimating the uncertainties in the CO2MVS capacity, including an Ensemble of Data Assimilation (EDA) configuration for the IFS, the extension of the VERIFY Community Inversion Framework (CIF) to include more (inverse) models and used for a study on transport errors, and a new flux measurement-based evaluation toolbox was implemented in such a way that it can remain available beyond the CoCO2 project.
• The submission of a report to the UNFCCC 1st Global Stocktake (GST) summarising the data from some of the CoCO2 prototype systems, supported by more detailed documentation, the production of national Fact Sheets for 2021 following the methodology and workflow from the VERIFY project, and design ideas for an Evaluation and Quality Control (EQC) system building on existing approaches in the CAMS operational service, on the experience from the CoCO2 project, and on the experience gained in the atmospheric inversion community in general.
• Several documents describing the requirements and availability of in situ observations, including a gap analysis and data pipeline document.
• Three synthesis reports of consistent estimates of emissions of CO2 and CH4, building on the previous VERIFY work, but focusing on global scale and top-10 emitters to provide (potential) users with examples of reconciliations of GHG estimates between inventories and bottom-up and top-down observation-based emissions to form the basis of a future GST supporting process.
• Two User Consultation Workshop organised in collaboration with ICLEI to engage sub-national entities and other local stakeholders in the process of product development of the new CO2MVS capacity.
• A draft Decision Support Blueprint in support of the implementation of an adequate user interface in CAMS.
• Continual interactions with the CO2 Task Force and the CO2M MAG, the WMO/IG3IS Steering Committee, CEOS Task Force meetings, the GCOS Implementation Plan, and provision of relevant input to the WMO Implementation Plan for a Global Greenhouse Gas Watch programme.
The project results have been shown at many conferences, workshops, and other meetings, including COP26, COP27, and COP28. Finally, a presentation day was organised in December 2022 and a General Assembly in November 2023 to show progress to the various stakeholder groups. The GA also included a dedicated session on user engagement with national inventory agencies, to which also some other related projects contributed. All public document deliverables are available on the CoCO2 website and datasets are as much as possible published on public data stores.
The CoCO2 activities addressed all components of the system, such as atmospheric transport models, re-analysis, data assimilation techniques, bottom-up estimation, in-situ networks, and ancillary measurements needed to address the attribution of CO2 emissions. Global, regional, national, and local scales were all addressed with the aim to have prototype systems at the required spatial scales ready by the end of the project as input for the foreseen CO2MVS in the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS). Because current and future CAMS services are set up through competitive Invitation-To-Tenders (ITTs), results from CoCO2 cannot always be directly transferred to CAMS. The exception to this were the CoCO2 developments directly related to the Integrated Forecasting System (IFS) from ECMWF, the Entrusted Entity for CAMS. CoCO2 therefore focused on significantly increasing the expertise and technical infrastructure in Europe in support of future implementation. During the ramp-up phase of the CO2MVS from 2024 onwards, CAMS service procurement can then directly benefit from these developments. The large number of peer-reviewed articles, in addition to the publicly available deliverable documents, is also in direct support of sharing the CoCO2 expertise and findings as widely as possible.