The Community Initiative for Emissions Research and Applications
Résumé
Emissions inventories at a variety of spatial and temporal scales are critical inputs to the understanding and prediction of air quality and climate. Systematic inventory evaluations, comparisons of different emission estimation methodologies, and quantification of emission uncertainties and their impacts are crucial to establish confidence in these datasets. We present the Community Initiative for Emissions Research and Applications (CIERA). CIERA is building an international community to catalyze emissions research by facilitating: the consistent, timely, and transparent development of emissions inventories at all scales; evaluations and analyses of emissions datasets; and the exchange and communication of emissions information. We discuss the motivation and vision for CIERA and illustrate its connections to existing efforts. We outline the developing CIERA distributed data system and demonstrate some examples of its applications. We encourage the emissions inventory development, research, and user communities at the local, national, and international levels to join the CIERA effort.