Estimating CO2 Emissions from Subsurface Coal Fires

Underground coal fires can burn for decades or more, and can pose serious health and environmental risks. These fires also contribute to global CO₂ emissions. Methods to estimate the rate of CO₂ emissions is an active research area. In this chapter, a number of methods to quantify this rate are discussed. Rate of emissions over large scale fires may be most efficiently quantified using remote sensing methods. These methods calculate coal consumption and CO₂ emissions rates using infrared satellite images. On an individual fire scale, direct measurement techniques are appropriate. Three independent approaches to quantify the rate of CO₂ emission from a coal fire in Colorado, USA, are presented.