Between the G20 meeting in Rome and now the COP26 meeting in Glasgow, GHGSat has made a substantial international impression. It can be said that this Canadian “NewSpace” company has become a, if not the, leading commercial global emissions monitoring company with assets in space, airborne sensors and an advanced AI powered analytics platform.
Today, Ottawa based Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC), which advances Cleantech startups and which reports to Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED), announced its third investment in GHGSat. This time investing $20 million.
GHGSat will use the new funds to build three more satellites in effort to complete its constellation of 10 global emissions monitoring satellites. GHGSat had already received funding in July for GHGSat-C3, C4 and C5. The new funding will allow the company to have 8 satellites deployed by sometime in 2023.
Steven Guilbeault, the new Minister of Environment and Climate Change said in a press release “reducing methane emissions is one of the fastest and cheapest ways to slow the rate of warming and fight climate change. That’s why this investment comes at such a critical time. This week at the United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26), Canada joined a number of other countries in signing on to the Global Methane Pledge, while committing to a world-leading 75% reduction below 2012 levels in methane emissions from the oil and gas sector by 2030. Canadian innovations, such as GHGSat’s trailblazing satellite technology, can help track emissions and keep us on course. This Montréal-based start-up shows how Canadian business leadership and innovation will help create new opportunities as we work together for a more sustainable future.”
GHGSat joins the International Methane Emissions Observatory
The funding follows news last Friday from the G20 meeting in Rome that the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) with support from the European Union had launched a new program called the International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO).
The observatory will include data gathered from European Space Agency (ESA) assets as well as data collected by GHGSat.
GHGSat’s participation follows a Memorandum of Intent signed between ESA, the Canadian Space Agency and GHGSat in 2019.
Canadian Space Agency President Lisa Campbell said in ESA press release that “GHGSat’s early efforts to build a previously unimagined commercial capability have come together at a time when urgent climate action is essential. GHGSat’s contribution of Canadian commercial data and know-how to IMEO builds on the achievement of scientific and operational collaboration.”
GHGSat CEO, Stephane Germain said, “We are glad to be ready today with Earth observation data that contributes to our collective understanding of industrial methane emissions. We believe this data will provide unique insights to help with the IMEO’s important work. We look forward to continued collaboration with ESA and deeper collaboration with IMEO to integrate public and private data to support emissions mitigation.”
To coincide with the launch of IMEO, a report was released titled An Eye on Methane: International Methane Emissions Observatory 2021 Report. The report “laid out its Theory of Change, at the heart of which is the need for an independent and trusted entity to integrate these multiple sources of heterogenous data into a coherent and policy-relevant dataset. The report also includes the analysis of the first reports submitted by the company members of the OGMP 2.0. During this first year, most companies put significant effort into reporting and outlined ambitious 2025 reduction targets. Out of the 55 companies that set targets, 30 meet or exceed the recommended targets of 45% reduction or near-zero methane intensity, and 51 have submitted plans that provide confidence the accuracy of their data will improve in the next 3-5 years.”
“Hosted by UNEP, IMEO is budgeted at EUR 100 million (CDN $143M) over five years. To maintain its independence and credibility, it will receive no industry funding. Instead, IMEO will be entirely funded by governments and philanthropies, with core resources provided by the European Commission as a founding member.”