A carbon dioxide-mapping satellite and four other Earth-observing spacecraft are scheduled to launch tonight (July 25) by the European Space Agency from their facilities in Kourou, French Guiana. The launch vehicle will be their four-stage, 115-foot-tall (35 meters) Vega C rocket.
The launch is scheduled for 10:03 PM EDT and coverage on YouTube will begin at 9:40 PM. I realize most of you will miss launch time but I'm expecting that link to replay the launch video.
The "headline" payload is called MicroCarb, a project led by the French space agency CNES.
This 400-pound (180-kilogram) satellite "is designed to map sources and sinks of carbon dioxide (CO2) — the most important greenhouse gas — on a global scale," CNES officials wrote in a mission description.
MicroCarb will be able to determine CO2 concentrations with a precision of one part per million. The satellite will operate in sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 404 miles (650 kilometers), for at least five years, if all goes to plan.
The other four satellites will make up the CNES' CO3D ("Constellation Optique en 3D") Earth-observing constellation. Each spacecraft in the quartet weighs about 550 pounds (250 kg) and will operate in sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 312 miles (502 km) for at least six years, according to CNES.
The satellites, which were built by Airbus, "have a unique optical instrument with a spatial resolution of approximately 50 cm [20 inches] in the red, green and blue visible bands and in the near-infrared," CNES wrote in a mission description. "After processing on the ground, their data will yield 3D maps of all of Earth’s land surfaces between -60 degree and +70 degree latitudes."
The CO3D satellites will be deployed around an hour after liftoff, and MicroCarb will be deployed 44 minutes after the four.
This will be the fifth launch overall for the Vega C, and the third since an anomaly in the rocket's second stage caused a mission failure in December 2022. The first two launches after the anomaly were successful.
Artist's conception of the MicroCarb satellite from the mission description: Image credit: CNES
Four stages in 115'. Impressive. I've been on boats, not ships, with masts taller than that.
ReplyDeleteI suspect the CO2 sensing is to help implement who pays and how much for spewing that awful, awful gas.
In honor of CNES, I am going to procure a CO2 generator. I'm gonna pop the top of all kinds of fizzies for the next several years. Doing my part, showing who's boss.
Very good point on the height of the rocket Rick. I was not paying attention when I read it. For comparison, Falcon 9 is 229 feet tall and the space shuttle solid boosters were 149 feet tall. Vega C is 3 parts solid, one part liquid staged. Weird.
DeleteCarbon dioxide isn't the most important "greenhouse gas" (except to the communists who use it as a weapon), water vapor is.
ReplyDeleteAs I've been saying for as long as I can remember, "wake me up when you can successfully model clouds." Seriously the whole way that clouds can reduce temperature in some instances and raise it in others seems to be a stumbling block they can't quite get over.
DeleteThe perfect example of scientists not understanding water vapor was all the unknown unknowns after that huge arsed Hunga Monga Tunga underwater volcano tossed bajillion gallons of water into the upper atmosphere. Only one group of brains said it would mess with world weather patterns for 2-3 years, and they got poo-pooed by other scientists.
DeleteAs to other weatherguessers, my forehead (allergies) and my wife's back (accident and tumor) are better forecasters. But we're not 'scientists' so nobody 'scientific' will listen to us.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but are these people really claiming
ReplyDeletethat CO2 is "the most important greenhouse gas" even though it is reportedly 0.04ish% of the atmosphere?
Shouldn't we focus all our efforts on cow flatulence?
Yes, they really are claiming CO2 is most important, and yes they are part of the warmunistas who want to impose control over everything by the top 1% of society / One World Government-freaks.
DeleteI almost didn't post this because of the silliness, but my silly streak seems to be seeing the movement I expect of actual science - to be "self-correcting" rather than free-loading. While it seems counterintuitive, saying science is self-correcting is saying that published data and measurements should always be considered wrong, not unquestionable. Admittedly, that's a rare perspective, but what a mission like MicroCarb could be able to do is to gather data that shows their models are based on bad data, and with them, those models' predictions don't describe reality.
Far more methane is released by the Amazon Rain Forest than an equal amount of good grazing lands with cattle on them.
DeleteMost rain forests are horrible oxygen thieves, not oxygen producers.