Ultraviolet remote sensing of volcanic emissions

Abstract

Satellite-based ultraviolet remote sensing of volcanic eruptions has produced quantitative measurements of the mass of sulfur dioxide and ash in volcanic clouds by accounting for ozone absorption and Rayleigh scattering in the atmos phere. These retrieval techniques were developed with data from the total ozone mapping spectrometer (TOMS) instruments on American, Russian, and Japanese satellites. The sulfur dioxide retrievals have been validated against groundbased Brewer and COSPEC measurements. The ash mass retrievals are in agreement with AVHRR two-band infrared ash retrievals. Daily satellite moni toring has detected, tracked, and quantified S0 2 emissions from a wide range of eruptive activity, from highly explosive to effusive types, and has produced an unprecedented 20-year record of global volcanism. Primary findings from the TOMS data are (1) observations of "excess sulfur" over that liberated during liq uid-phase degassing have indicated the existence of a volatile phase in pre empted magma; (2) indirect evidence for co-erupted H 2 S gas from apparent in crease in S0 2 mass in drifting clouds; (3) insights into the removal rates of S0 2 from the atmosphere, interactions with co-emitted ash particles, and responses to meteorological conditions; and (4) potential operational application of sulfur di oxide and ash detection for aviation hazard mitigation.

Retrieval of large volcanic SO2 columns from the Aura Ozone Monitoring Instrument: Comparison and limitations

“…All the equations presented in this paper are equally valid and can be used without any modification in the iterative retrieval, which can be implemented as the repeated application of LF algorithm steps, each of which takes the state vector derived at the previous step as its new linearization point, similar to the steps in the modified Krueger-Kerr algorithm [Krueger et al, 2000]. Doing so, X 0 would approach the correct value, so that the term (X À X 0 )…”

“…Remote sensing instruments measuring solar backscattered ultraviolet (BUV) radiation on board satellite platforms have played critical role in monitoring and quantifying these SO 2 emissions. The most notable of these instruments was the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) [Krueger, 1983;McPeters et al, 1998], which provided a unique and near-continuous long-term (from 1978 to 2006) data record of volcanic SO 2 [Krueger et al, 2000;Carn et al, 2003;A. J. Krueger et al, El Chichon: The genesis of volcanic sulfur dioxide monitoring from space, submitted to Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research, 2007] and ash [Krotkov et al, , 1999a[Krotkov et al, , 1999bSeftor et al, 1997] emissions.…”

Estimation of SO2emissions using OMI retrievals

“…[2] Satellite SO 2 observations have been used to monitor plumes from volcanic eruptions [e.g., Krueger et al, 2000] and to calculate volcanic SO 2 budgets. More recently, it was demonstrated that satellite instruments can also detect SO 2 signals from anthropogenic sources [e.g., Eisinger and Burrows, 1998;Carn et al, 2007;Georgoulias et al, 2009;Lee et al, 2011] and even study the evolution of emissions from very large source regions, e.g., in China [Witte et al, 2009;Li et al, 2010].…”

Satellite detection of hazardous volcanic clouds and the risk to global air traffic

“…Hanstrum and Watson (1983) studied the April, 1992 Galunggung, Indonesia eruptions from a meteorological perspective and noted the usefulness of satellite data in detecting ash plumes. Krueger (1983), Krueger et al (1995) and Krueger et al (2000) have shown that ultra-violet measurements from TOMS, designed to measure ozone, could be used to track volcanic SO 2 clouds. Carn et al (2004) has shown that TOMS could also be used to measure man-made SO 2 emissions.…”