Methane (CH₄) contributes to about a third of today's anthropogenic global warming. Radiocarbon (¹⁴C) measurements of atmospheric CH₄ can be used to track its origin: either from biogenic sources (such as agriculture, waste handling, lakes/reservoirs or wetlands) or from fossil sources (e.g. fossil-fuel combustion or leakages from natural gas networks).
Based on a novel CH₄ extraction setup, we want to extend the number of atmospheric ¹⁴CH₄ measurements within the new-starting interdisciplinary SNSF-project RICH, which aims to develop a national radiocarbon inventory of Switzerland for all compartments of the ecosystem.

This work was carried out in the group of Prof. Dr. Sönke Szidat.

References:

• C. Espic, M. Liechti, M. Battaglia, D. Paul, T. Röckmann, S. Szidat;
  "Compound-specific radiocarbon analysis of atmospheric methane: a new preconcentration and purification setup"
  Radiocarbon, 2019, 61(51), 1461-1476; doi:10.1017/RDC.2019.76.
• T. Eglinton, H. Graven, S. Szidat, F. Hagedorn;
  "Radiocarbon Inventories of Switzerland (RICH): An integrated approach to understand the changing carbon cycle"
  Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), 2020; http://p3.snf.ch/project-193770.