A Chinese research team has developed a new remote-sensing satellite model, which has for the first time achieved the high-precision, dynamic calculation of CO2 emissions from large coal-fired power plants, providing a new solution for global carbon emissions monitoring.

Coal-fired power plants account for nearly 50 per cent of the total carbon emissions from fossil fuel combustion globally. They are a crucial component in the estimation of carbon emissions resulting from human activity. The precise, scientific calculation of carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants is of significant importance.

However, established calculation methods depend heavily on the product of fuel consumption reported by power plants and carbon emissions factors, which makes estimations difficult to compare and verify. Current remote-sensing satellite technology can also result in inversion errors as high as 50 per cent due to background interference and atmospheric instability.

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The research team at the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Aerospace Information Research Institute optimized algorithms and constructed this new model to quantify the CO2 emissions of 14 large coal-fired power plants around the world based on satellite data, significantly improving inversion accuracy.

According to the team's recent paper in the Journal of Cleaner Production, the new model provides an objective, effective means for the verification of carbon emissions from key global sources, and offers a scientific basis for carbon-trading auditing and the calibration of emissions reduction policies.