Some of today’s most important environmental concerns relate to the composition of the atmosphere. The increasing concentration of the greenhouse gases and the cooling effect of aerosol are prominent drivers of a changing climate, but the extent of their impact is often still uncertain.

At the Earth’s surface, aerosols, ozone and other reactive gases such as nitrogen dioxide determine the quality of the air around us, affecting human health and life expectancy, the health of ecosystems and the fabric of the built environment. Ozone distributions in the stratosphere influence the amount of ultraviolet radiation reaching the surface. Dust, sand, smoke and volcanic aerosols affect the safe operation of transport systems and the availability of power from solar generation, the formation of clouds and rainfall, and the remote sensing by satellite of land, ocean and atmosphere.

To address these environmental concerns there is a need for data and processed information. The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) has been developed to meet these needs, aiming at supporting policymakers, business and citizens with enhanced atmospheric environmental information.

What information will the Atmosphere Monitoring Service provide?

The Service will consolidate many years of preparatory research and development that was funded by the European Union in the form of the series of MACC projects. MACC brought together partner organisations from across Europe with expertise in areas such as environmetal monitoring and forecasting, operational forecasting services, and research of atmospheric composition.

CAMS delivers the following operational services:

• Daily production of near-real-time analyses and forecasts of global atmospheric composition
• Reanalyses providing consistent multi-annual global datasets of atmospheric composition with a frozen model/assimilation system
• Daily production of near-real-time European air quality analyses and forecasts with a multi-model ensemble system
• Reanalyses providing consistent annual datasets of European air quality with a frozen model/assimilation system, supporting in particular policy applications
• Products to support policy users, adding value to “raw” data products in order to deliver information products in a form adapted to policy applications and policy-relevant work
• Solar and UV radiation products supporting the planning, monitoring, and efficiency improvements of solar energy production and providing quantitative information on UV irradiance for downstream applications related to health and ecosystems
• Greenhouse gas surface flux inversions for CO2, CH4 and N2O, allowing the monitoring of the evolution in time of these fluxes
• Climate forcings from aerosols and long-lived (CO2, CH4) and shorter-lived (stratospheric and tropospheric ozone) agents
• Anthropogenic emissions for the global and European domains and global emissions from wildfires and biomass burning