NASA's New Carbon-Counting Instrument Leaves the Nest (OCO-2)

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http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2012-134

NASA's New Carbon-Counting Instrument Leaves the Nest
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
May 10, 2012

PASADENA, Calif. - Its construction now complete, the science
instrument that is the heart of NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2)
spacecraft - NASA's first mission dedicated to studying atmospheric carbon
dioxide - has left its nest at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,
Calif., and has arrived at its integration and test site in Gilbert, Ariz.

A truck carrying the OCO-2 instrument left JPL before dawn on Tuesday,
May 9, to begin the trek to Orbital Science Corporation's Satellite Manufacturing
Facility in Gilbert, southeast of Phoenix, where it arrived that afternoon.
The instrument will be unpacked, inspected and tested. Later this month,
it will be integrated with the Orbital-built OCO-2 spacecraft bus, which
arrived in Gilbert on April 30.

Once technicians ensure the spacecraft is clean of any contaminants, the
observatory's integration and test campaign will kick off. That campaign will
be conducted in two parts, with the first part scheduled for completion in October.
The observatory will then be stored in Gilbert for about nine months while the
launch vehicle is prepared. The integration and test campaign will then resume,
with completion scheduled for spring 2014. OCO-2 will then be shipped to Vandenberg Air
Force Base, Calif., in preparation for a launch as early as the summer
of 2014.

"The OCO-2 instrument looks great, and its delivery to Orbital's
Gilbert, Ariz., facility is a big step forward in successfully launching
and operating the mission in space," said Ralph Basilio, OCO-2 project
manager at JPL.

OCO-2 is the latest mission in NASA's study of the global
carbon cycle. Carbon dioxide is the most significant human-produced greenhouse
gas and the principal human-produced driver of climate change. The original
OCO mission was lost shortly after launch on Feb. 24, 2009, when the Taurus
XL launch vehicle carrying it malfunctioned and failed to reach orbit.

The experimental OCO-2 mission, which is part of NASA's Earth System Science
Pathfinder Program, will uniformly sample the atmosphere above Earth's
land and ocean, collecting more than half a million measurements of carbon
dioxide concentration over Earth's sunlit hemisphere every day for at
least two years. It will do so with the accuracy, resolution and coverage
needed to provide the first complete picture of the regional-scale geographic
distribution and seasonal variations of both human and natural sources
of carbon dioxide emissions and their sinks-the places where carbon dioxide
is removed from the atmosphere and stored.

Scientists will use OCO-2 mission data to improve global carbon cycle models,
better characterize the processes responsible for adding and removing carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere, and make more accurate predictions of global climate
change.

The mission provides a key new measurement that can be combined with other
ground and aircraft measurements and satellite data to answer important
questions about the processes that regulate atmospheric carbon dioxide
and its role in the carbon cycle and climate. This information could help
policymakers and business leaders make better decisions to ensure climate
stability and retain our quality of life. The mission will also serve
as a pathfinder for future long-term satellite missions to monitor carbon
dioxide.

Each of the OCO-2 instrument's three high-resolution spectrometers
spreads reflected sunlight into its various colors like a prism, focusing
on a different, narrow color range to detect light with the specific colors
absorbed by carbon dioxide and molecular oxygen. The amount of light absorbed
at these specific colors is proportional to the concentration of carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere. Scientists will use these data in computer
models to quantify global carbon dioxide sources and sinks.

OCO-2 is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Orbital
Sciences Corporation, Dulles, Va., built the spacecraft and provides mission
operations under JPL's leadership. The California Institute of Technology
in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.

For more information on OCO-2, visit:
http://oco.jpl.nasa.gov/ and http://www.nasa.gov/oco .

Alan Buis 818-354-0474
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
Alan...@jpl.nasa.gov

2012-134