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Full catalog/TEMPO_HCHO_L2
TEMPO_HCHO_L2·vV03·dataset

Formaldehyde in the air over North America (TEMPO)

TEMPO formaldehyde total column V03 (PROVISIONAL)
atmosphere NASA LARC_CLOUD Level 2 netCDF-4
In plain English

What it measures. Maps of formaldehyde in the air over North America, given as the total amount in a vertical column of atmosphere, at roughly 10 km resolution. Formaldehyde is a gas linked to emissions and atmospheric chemistry.

How it's made. Retrieved from the TEMPO instrument, which watches North America from a fixed vantage in geostationary orbit, by analyzing the spectrum of sunlight and converting it into vertical column amounts.

How & where you'd use it. Helps study air pollution and atmospheric chemistry over North America; note this is a provisional release, meaning it has reached an early validation stage.

What's measured

ATMOSPHERE › AIR QUALITY › VOLATILE ORGANIC COMPOUNDSATMOSPHERE › ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY › CARBON AND HYDROCARBON COMPOUNDS › FORMALDEHYDE

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2023-08-02 → 2025-09-16
  • Measured byIS-40e (TEMPO)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • FormatsnetCDF-4
  • StatusCOMPLETE

What you can do with it

  • Map air pollutants — NO₂, aerosols, ozone
  • Track greenhouse gases and Earth's energy budget
  • Feed weather and air-quality analysis
Official description

Formaldehyde Level 2 files provide trace gas information at TEMPO’s native spatial resolution, ~10 km^2 at the center of the Field of Regard (FOR), for individual granules. Each granule covers the entire North-South TEMPO FOR but only a portion of the East-West FOR. The files are provided in netCDF4 format, and contain information on vertical columns, ancillary data used in air mass factor calculations and reference sector corrections, and retrieval quality flags. The retrieval uses a three-step approach: (1) spectral fitting of slant columns, (2) air mass factor calculation and derivation of vertical columns, and (3) reference sector corrections. These data reached provisional validation on December 9, 2024.

Get the data

tempo_hcho_l2_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="TEMPO_HCHO_L2",
    version="V03",
    bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9),  # your area (W,S,E,N)
    temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"),       # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results)   # stream straight from LARC_CLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.