Artist rendition of TEMPO. Photo: NASA/SAO

Ball Aerospace and Technologies successfully completed development of an Earth science instrument to measure air pollution over North America, and has been formally accepted by NASA. The Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution instrument (TEMPO) will be the first space-based instrument to monitor major air pollutants across the North American continent hourly during daytime. In doing so, it aims to revolutionize air quality forecasts and emission control strategies, and enable effective early public warning of pollution events.

NASA and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) Principal Investigator Kelly Chance partnered with Ball to design, manufacture, and test this Earth science instrument. The environmental test campaign conducted by Ball aims to verify that TEMPO will survive all of the challenges related to launch, as well as sustained operations in Geostationary Orbit (GEO).

“With completion of the instrument and full spaceflight qualification by Ball, we are extremely excited about the acceptance of TEMPO, which will lay the framework for NASA and SAO’s critical air quality measurements,” said TEMPO Project Manager Stephen Hall at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.