title: Evaluating measurements of carbon dioxide emissions using a precision source--A natural gas burner.
abstract: A natural gas burner has been used as a precise and accurate source for generating large quantities of carbon dioxide (CO2) to evaluate emissions measurements at near-industrial scale. Two methods for determining carbon dioxide emissions from stationary sources are considered here: predicting emissions based on fuel consumption measurements-predicted emissions measurements, and direct measurement of emissions quantities in the flue gas-direct emissions measurements. Uncertainty for the predicted emissions measurement was estimated at less than 1%. Uncertainty estimates for the direct emissions measurement of carbon dioxide were on the order of ±4%. The relative difference between the direct emissions measurements and the predicted emissions measurements was within the range of the measurement uncertainty, therefore demonstrating good agreement. The study demonstrates how independent methods are used to validate source emissions measurements, while also demonstrating how a fire research facility can be used as a precision test-bed to evaluate and improve carbon dioxide emissions measurements from stationary sources.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Fossil-fuel-consuming stationary sources such as electric power plants and industrial facilities account for more than half of the CO2 emissions in the United States. Therefore, accurate emissions measurements from these sources are critical for evaluating efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This study demonstrates how a surrogate for a stationary source, a fire research facility, can be used to evaluate the accuracy of measurements of CO2 emissions.
authors.affiliation: a National Institute of Standards and Technology , Gaithersburg , MD , USA.
authors.forename: Rodney
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bryant
authors.forename: Matthew
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bundy
authors.forename: Ruowen
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Zong
mesh_terms: D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000737:chemistry*; D002245:Carbon Dioxide / Q000737:chemistry*; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D017752:Greenhouse Effect; D059206:Natural Gas / Q000032:analysis*
chemical_list: D000393:Air Pollutants; D059206:Natural Gas; D002245:Carbon Dioxide