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The $88 million satellite, backed by Google, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk’s SpaceX, has been lost in space, ranging from a global effort to detect planetary warming emissions of powerful greenhouse gas methane from the oil and gas industry.
The Metanesat satellite was launched on SpaceX in March 2024 and monitors leakage of methane, an invisible greenhouse gas that is responsible for almost a third of global warming in the industrial era.
But this week, Metanesart said the satellite “is likely to lose power and not be resilient.”
“The engineering team is conducting a thorough investigation into the loss of communication, and this is expected to take time,” the statement said, adding that work on its methane emissions efforts will continue.
The Environmental Defense Fund, a nonprofit that spearheaded the satellite, told the Financial Times that it was “too early to tell if another satellite would be released.”
“Now, the focus is on understanding what happened, continuing to process and release high-quality methane data that we have already collected, and applying proven technology and insights from our mission.”
Called “one of the most advanced methane tracking satellites in the universe,” the device collected emissions data and images at oil and gas sites around the world.
This was one of the number of satellites born in recent years to collect data on methane leaks as a nation and fossil fuel company that has pledged to deal with extremely powerful gas emissions.
Over 100 countries led by the US and Europe have registered in 2021 with a global methane pledge to reduce emissions by 30% by the end of the decade.
The energy industry is the second largest contributor to human-raised methane emissions after agriculture. However, addressing industry methane emissions is considered one of the cheapest and fastest opportunities available to tackle global warming.
However, experts warn that energy companies have found many ways to hide the magnitude of their emissions, making them essential for tracking emissions.
“Oil and gas emit far more methane than we know,” Eric Court, professor of climate and space science and engineering at the University of Michigan, told FT last year.
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Bezos Earth Fund, a Bezos charity, said last July it would provide $10 million in funding to EDF to support Methanesate after already providing a three-year, $100 million contribution in 2020. The satellite was supported by the New Zealand government and others.
Google also provided the AI computing capabilities needed to crunch the enormous amount of data generated by orbiting methane monitors.
Satellites are designed to measure methane emissions that other satellites cannot. You can also calculate where they come from and how they change over time.
Global energy methane emissions remained at nearly record levels in 2024, and the International Energy Agency said earlier this year that 70% of such emissions can be avoided at low cost.
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