Urban expansion and rising traffic are pushing carbon dioxide levels on our roads to new highs – impacting climate, health and efforts toward carbon neutrality. Tackling this challenge requires precise, real-time data.
Researchers at the Chinese mainland's Aerospace Information Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have developed a hybrid framework that traces on-road CO2 emissions with unprecedented 30-meter resolution, updating every hour. This innovation, detailed in Sustainable Cities and Society, is already in action in Shenzhen, in the Chinese mainland's Guangdong Province.
The system combines Panoptic-Artificial Intelligence (Panoptic-AI) with a mobile observation network. Panoramic cameras, high-precision greenhouse-gas analyzers and meteorological sensors work in tandem during mobile surveys to capture multi-source data – ranging from traffic volumes and road layouts to vegetation cover and weather conditions.
In field tests across Shenzhen's urban roads, the team achieved over 93% accuracy in pinpointing emission sources. Beyond mapping hotspots, the platform quantifies how individual factors – like congestion, surrounding land cover and wind patterns – influence carbon output, revealing the spatio-temporal dynamics of urban emissions.
"This technique represents an innovative deployment of AI in environmental monitoring, as well as enabling a multi-dimensional and full-spectrum carbon monitoring system combined with conventional emission inventories and satellite-based greenhouse-gas monitoring technologies," says Wang Li, corresponding author of the study.
As this hybrid framework gears up for deployment in more cities, it promises to equip policymakers, urban planners and sustainability champions with the insights needed to drive targeted emissions reductions – and pave the way toward cooler, cleaner cities.
Reference(s):
Chinese scientists monitor on-road CO2 emissions via hybrid framework
cgtn.com
