GERMANY: Researchers from Goethe University Frankfurt have put a measuring gadget into operation on a mountain close to Frankfurt to measure atmospheric F-gases.

The Observatory on Kleiner Feldberg within the Taunus mountain vary in Hesse, will constantly monitor the concentrations of halogenated greenhouse gases with very excessive accuracy for the primary time in Germany.  

With preliminary outcomes indicating that sources of F-gases are current in Germany, the scientists in Frankfurt insist that recording F-gases must be included within the official air monitoring programme in the long run.

The measuring gadget referred to as Medusa inside ACTRIS (Aerosol, Clouds and Trace Gases Research Infrastructure), the pan-European analysis infrastructure gathering knowledge and data on short-lived atmospheric constituents.

Their measurements of halogenated greenhouse gases are additionally included within the worldwide AGAGE community, which has been monitoring the incidence of climate-relevant hint gases at stations all around the world since 1978. 

Professor Andreas Engel from the Institute for Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences at Goethe University Frankfurt, who’s answerable for Medusa, stated: “Our measurements have already clearly shown that there are significant sources of F-gases in Germany. We have therefore joined forces within an EU-funded project with other researchers, primarily from Germany, Switzerland and the UK, to quantify F-gas emissions on the basis of these measurements with the help of computer models and to further narrow down their regions of origin.”

The very low concentrations, the big variety of elements to be measured and the excessive accuracies required make the measurements very complicated, however Engel is satisfied that, due to their significance, measuring F-gases ought to shift from analysis to official air monitoring in the long run.

“We need to set up a programme that also integrates the systematic recording of halogenated greenhouse gases, including F-gases, into the official atmospheric measurement system. This could deliver sufficient data to identify sources and take appropriate countermeasures,” he stated.