Harvard scientists are tackling a major climate change challenge: targeting emissions of methane, a gas with a much shorter lifespan in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide but 80 times the warming potential. With a privately funded globe-spanning satellite for detecting emitters, and a Salata Institute-sponsored initiative aimed at developing reduction strategies for the gas, researchers spanning Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and faculty experts in history, law, and policy seek to slow near-term global warming by significantly reducing those emissions, thus buying humanity time to reduce carbon emissions and adapt to a changing climate.
Addressing climate change has traditionally been the purview of governments and the United Nations. But in 2015, Rotch professor of atmospheric and environmental science Steven Wofsy got a call from Robert Harris, an old friend at the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). Methane emissions—which account for nearly a third of today’s global warming—were rising, but scientists weren’t sure what sources were responsible for how much. What if there were a satellite, Harris asked, that collected information on emissions sources globally—enabling regulators, governments, and consumers to use the information?
That phone call sparked a years-long collaboration that culminated in MethaneSAT, a washing-machine-sized satellite launched on a SpaceX rocket last March that is now collecting groundbreaking data on methane emissions worldwide. While Harvard researchers played a central role in the satellite’s design and development, its construction, launch, and operations are funded entirely by private philanthropic donations to the EDF.
Paralleling MethaneSAT’s effort to target methane emissions from space, the Harvard Initiative on Reducing Global Methane Emissions, a cross-school research program established in 2023, is developing reduction strategies on the ground. Faculty members involved in the initiative have presented at COP 28 and 29, the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference. Researchers hope such interdisciplinary perspectives can contribute solutions that governments alone might not devise.
Charting the course for these initiatives outside government wasn’t always easy. When Wofsy proposed turning to philanthropy to fund MethaneSAT at an EDF board meeting, “People looked at this and said it’s mind-boggling—a private organization putting up a satellite doesn’t seem possible,” he remembers. “The advertised cost of MethaneSAT was $100 million—and that’s the advertised cost. It actually cost more than that.” But they succeeded: MethaneSAT is the first satellite of this scale to be fully privately funded. And Wofsy considers this funding model better suited to the project’s goals than government support. The mandate of NASA and other federal agencies is scientific discovery; engaging in policy-oriented research could politicize the work and jeopardize support and funding, he points out. With MethaneSAT, “The goal is to change people’s behavior. We have a societal application goal.”
The satellite relies on data collected by a spectrometer using light reflected from Earth’s surface to discern the concentration of methane in the atmosphere. It then produces high-resolution images indicating methane levels in an area spanning about 124 square miles: the warmer the color, the higher the concentration.
About half of MethaneSAT’s images will focus on the energy sector, which accounts for about 30 percent of global methane emissions. Previously, it was largely up to companies alone to measure and self-report their emissions. Now, MethaneSAT will fly over regions that produce 80 percent of the world’s oil and gas, enabling both companies and regulators to detect and repair leaks more quickly—and enabling consumers and regulators to see which facilities are emitting the most. The rest of the satellite’s observations will focus on other methane sources, such as landfills, livestock, and rice paddies. Researchers hope this wide-area monitoring will uncover unexpected methane sources that satellites focused on narrower areas would miss.
A team dedicated to interfacing with the public will make the data presentable: “Take this wonky stuff and turn it into something real people can understand,” Wofsy says. Researchers have already begun sharing images and analysis on MethaneSAT’s website and will continue to do so. This team will also communicate findings with global stakeholders, such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the United Nations’ International Methane Emissions Observatory.
By 2027, the MethaneSAT team hopes the data it collects will have galvanized efforts to reduce global methane emissions by at least 45 percent. Wofsy says the quality of the images collected by the satellite to date have been “beyond my fondest estimate.” The next step, sharing those images with the public, is just as crucial as the data collection. “If we produce the most beautiful science data in the world and write the most beautiful scientific papers, and it doesn’t affect methane emissions,” Wofsy emphasizes, “then we fail.”
