Author: Joseph Atkinson

We have power!

Two months after launch, following the successful testing of its Maxar built host satellite Intelsat 40e, NASA’s TEMPO (short for Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution) air quality instrument has been turned on for the first time.

A team at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts, will now begin to test the instrument to ensure its systems and components are working properly. TEMPO has to warm up for approximately one month to evaporate any water before cooling down to operational temperatures for additional system testing.

“We’ve been eagerly anticipating this moment,” said Kevin Daugherty, TEMPO project manager at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. “It brings us one step closer to observing North American air pollution like never before.”

From a geostationary, or fixed, orbit TEMPO will be the first satellite instrument to make hourly daytime observations of air quality over North America, including the entire continental United States. These observations will vastly improve the scientific data record on air pollution in North America.

TEMPO’s next major milestone will be in late July. “First light” is when the instrument is opened for the first time to look at the Sun and Earth. The early data instrument scientists collect at this time will allow them to tweak settings to optimize TEMPO’s performance before they commence with routine operations in October.

The TEMPO mission is a collaboration between the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA) and NASA. The TEMPO science team is based at the CfA and TEMPO’s project team is based at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

The satellite host of NASA’s Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution (TEMPO) instrument recently arrived by aircraft at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center ahead of its launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in early April.

From a geostationary, or fixed, orbit aboard the Maxar-built Intelsat 40e, TEMPO will be the first satellite instrument to make hourly daytime observations of air quality over North America, including the entire continental United States. These observations will vastly improve the scientific data record on air pollution in North America.

At the Cape, Intelsat 40e will undergo final testing to ensure it is ready for launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, and then integration onto the rocket. Ball Aerospace built the TEMPO instrument.

TEMPO Principal Investigator Kelly Chance is based at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory — part of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian — in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The TEMPO project team is based at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

Air pollution is an existential threat to millions of Americans with asthma and other health issues. Responding to that threat, NASA and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory are innovating to improve observations of air quality in North America.

Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution (TEMPO) is an ultraviolet and visible spectrometer that will be hosted on Intelsat 40e, a commercial satellite built by Maxar Technologies. TEMPO’s sensors will measure sunlight reflected and scattered by Earth’s surface and atmosphere, allowing it to observe the spectral signatures of air pollutants, including ozone and nitrogen dioxide.

On Feb. 27, 2023, the instrument and the entire spacecraft successfully passed pre-launch testing at Maxar’s facility in Palo Alto, California. TEMPO underwent thermal vacuum, dynamics, and end-to-end capability testing to ensure it will withstand launch conditions and the harsh environment of space. Tests also ensured that commanding, telemetry, and mission data are flowing accurately.

Scheduled to launch in April 2023 from Cape Canaveral aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, TEMPO will be the first instrument to observe air pollution hourly during daytime over North America. It will make measurements across an area that extends from Puerto Rico to northern Canada and from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific, encompassing the entire continental United States.

TEMPO data will play an important role in scientific studies of phenomena such as rush-hour pollution and the movement of emissions from forest fires and volcanoes. Scientists could eventually apply TEMPO observations to air quality alerts for people in pollution hot spots and those living with health issues.

TEMPO will also form part of a virtual constellation of air pollution monitors that will give scientists a big-picture view of air quality around the Northern Hemisphere.

Ball Aerospace in Broomfield, Colorado, built the TEMPO instrument. Kelly Chance, a scientist at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts — part of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian — is the principal investigator.