TanagerMethane

last updated: November 26, 2024

Methane Products Overview

Each TanagerMethane item will have the plumes that are able to be detected by a human operator within a corresponding TanagerScene based on a methane enhancement data layer, derived from a matched filter (doi:10.5194/amt-8-4383-2015).

TanagerMethane products are only offered in their orthorectified format. These products can be obtained from the Planet APIs through the TanagerScene item type.

A Tanager Methane Product is representative of a single plume and will have the dimensions of the plume extent. They are represented in the Planet Platform as the TanagerMethane item type.

The Methane QuickLook (MQL) bundle is designed for easy interpretation by methane experts with limited remote sensing knowledge. Within each bundle customers will have access to multiple imagery assets, listed below, for their purposes.

Tanager Methane QuickLook Products

Tanager’s Methane QuickLook is a low latency, derived methane product that will reveal point source emission locations and estimates of magnitude in kg/hr for observed plumes This product will be delivered to customers within a 72 hour timeframe after acquisition enabling customers to quickly identify and take action where emissions are detected.

Available Assets

Asset Name Asset-Type Description
Ortho Methane QuickLook Plume ortho_ql_ch4 Preliminary 8-bit scaled methane plume intensity in (ppm-m) parts-per-million-meter, in GeoTIFF format. The image will contain an alpha channel indicating pixels with no plume detections.
MethaneQuickLook Plume Metadata ql_ch4_json Preliminary plume locations, length, size in kg/hr and confidence measure indicating the level of visual interpretation certainty, in GeoJSON format.

Methane Plume Metadata

Relevant for ql_ch4_json TanagerMethane assets.

Parameter Description Type
plume_id Unique identifier for each plume. The format is <stripid>_<part>. The “part” postfix (e.g., "A", “B”, “C”) identifies multiple plumes captured in the same image in the order they were detected. string
plume_latitude Latitude estimate of plume origin.
plume_longitude Longitude estimate of plume origin.
plume_quality This field is only used for Methane QuickLook, ql_ch4_json asset-type. Qualitative assessment of plume quality captured by a human operator during the plume detection process (good, questionable or bad). More on Plume quality classification below. string
datetime Date and time of the acquisition in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). datetime
ime The total kilograms (kg) of methane in a plume above the background concentration at the time of image capture. float
fetch Plume length, meters (m) float
emission Quantified emission rate of a plume, estimated using the Integrated Methane Enhancement method. (Duren et al., 2019 - "California's Methane Super-Emitters", Nature)
emission_uncertainty The uncertainty in an emission rate, derived from uncertainty in IME and wind speed.
wind_speed_avg Mean wind speed m/s float
wind_speed_std Standard deviation wind speed m/s float
wind_direction_avg Wind direction (degrees) float
wind_direction_std Wind direction standard deviation (degrees) float
wind_source Wind source from reanalysis. (e.g. Openmeteo, HRRR, ERA5) string
strip_id Strip ID of the Tanager collect that was used for plume detection. string

Item Properties

The following is the metadata that is publicly available in the Data API for each TanagerScene and TanagerMethane item.

Parameter Description Type
_permissions Assets available for the item which the authenticated user has permission to download. array
geometry Geographic boundary of the item’s footprint, formatted as a GeoJSON polygon. json
id Globally unique item identifier. string
acquired The RFC 3339 acquisition time of the image. datetime
cloud_percent Percent of cloud values in the dataset. Cloud values represent scene content areas (non-blackfilled) that contain opaque clouds which prevent reliable interpretation of the land cover content. double
collection_mode Maximum Sensitivity (4x8), Standard Sensitivity (1x8), Glint string
ground_control If the image meets the positional accuracy specifications this value will be true. If the image has uncertain positional accuracy, this value will be false. boolean
gsd The average ground sampling distance of the associated Item. Computed for each item to account for variations over the length of a collection. double
item_type The name of the item type. For example, TanagerScene or TanagerMethane. string (e.g. TanagerScene)
light_haze_percent Percent of light haze values in the dataset. Light haze values represent scene content areas (non-blackfilled) that contain thin low altitude clouds, higher altitude cirrus clouds, soot and dust which allow reliable recognition of land cover features, and have up to +/-10% uncertainty on commonly used indices (EVI and NDWI). double
pixel_resolution Pixel resolution of the ortho products associated with this Item. double
provider Name of the imagery provider. string (e.g. "tanager","planetscope", "skysat")
published The RFC 3339 timestamp at which this item was added to the API. datetime
publishing_stage Stage of publishing for an item. TanagerScene items will be first published and remain in the “finalized” stage. string
quality_category Metric for image quality. To qualify for “standard” image quality an image must meet a variety of quality standards. If the image does not meet these criteria it is considered “test” quality. string: “standard” or “test”
satellite_azimuth Tanager’s off track pointing direction, in degrees (0-360). double
satellite_id Globally unique identifier of the satellite that acquired the underlying imagery. I.E. 4001 string
strip_id The unique identifier of the image strip that the item came from. string
sun_azimuth The angle of the sun, as seen by the observer, measured clockwise from the north (0 - 360). double
sun_elevation The angle of the sun above the horizon (0 - 90). double
updated The RFC 3339 timestamp at which this item was updated in the API. datetime
view_angle The satellite’s across-track, off-nadir viewing angle. double


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