Vulcan version 4.0 high-resolution annual fossil fuel and cement production carbon dioxide emissions in the United States for the 2010-2022 time period
Abstract
Vulcan version 4.0 is a dataset representing annual United States carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the combustion of fossil fuel and cement production at high spatial resolution for the 2010-2022 time period. It provides an update and improvements to the Vulcan version 3.0 data product previously available and reported in the literature. Emissions are separately reported as a total and by economic sector and fuel type. While the “native” spatial resolution of Vulcan is at the point, line, and US Census block spatial scale, we report here on the results placed into a 1 km x 1 km spatial grid at an annual time resolution. The approach uses multiple federal, state, and local data sources to estimate the CO2 emission magnitude and distribute those emissions in space and time associated with patterns related to the underlying combustion technology, infrastructure, and human behavior. Given the increased interest in greenhouse gas mitigation at sub-national scales, particularly cities, this data offers the opportunity to better understand the emitting landscape and craft more targeted, efficient policy instruments. The Vulcan output also offers the scientific community CO2 emissions applicable to a wide range of study fields, including carbon cycle science, climate science, environmental policy, urban planning, and socioeconomic research.
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Page: 1 Annual U.S. Vulcan Fossil Fuel Carbon Dioxide (FFCO2) Emissions Data Product version 4.0, 1km grid Updated: May 20, 2025 Contacts: Lech Gawuc ([email protected]) Kevin Gurney (kevin.[email protected]) Northern Arizona University PREAMBLE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT POLICY The Vulcan data product represents many years of development by many researchers with support, most recently, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). If you use the Vulcan data product in your research, we recommend that you contact Dr. Kevin Gurney to assure that the data product is being used in a way consistent with its strengths and weaknesses. In some instances, we consider it appropriate to include the Vulcan team in publications resulting from the use of the Vulcan data product. At a minimum, we kindly request that you cite the database and peer-reviewed paper establishing the data product (citations below) and acknowledge the funding agencies that have supported the Vulcan development. The following is the correct acknowledgement: “The Vulcan v4.0 data product was made possible through support from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, grants NA19OAR4310167 and NA20OAR4310297. CITATION Please cite both the dataset DOI (10.5281/zenodo.15446748) and the peer-reviewed publication: Gurney, K.R., P. Dass, A. Kato, L. Gawuc, B. Aslam, H. Sun (2025) Vulcan version 4.0 high-resolution annual estimates of fossil fuel and cement production carbon dioxide emissions in the United States for the 2010-2022 time period, under review at Scientific Data. The most recent publication for Vulcan version 4.0 describes methodological changes to Vulcan version 3.0 Hence, reference to Vulcan version 3.0 may be useful: Gurney, K.R., J. Liang, R. Patarasuk, Y. Song, J. Huang, G. Roest (2020) The Vulcan Version 3.0 HighResolution Fossil Fuel CO2 Emissions for the United States. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 125, 19, e2020JD032974. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020JD032974. FAIR USE DISCLAIMER The Vulcan data product is an attempt to estimate fossil fuel CO2 (FFCO2) emissions at fine time and space scales. It should be considered a “climatology” of emissions rather than the “weather” of emissions. By that, we mean that the estimates represent “typical” emissions at a specific time and place (average conditions). Hence, we do not consider it appropriate to use in comparison to short-term “campaign” style atmospheric measurements (e.g. 5 days of continuous monitoring at a specific location) without consideration of the mismatch between the measurement and the Vulcan estimation approach. SUMMARY The annual Vulcan version 4.0 FFCO2 emissions represent annual carbon dioxide emissions due to the combustion of fossil fuel and cement production in the United States spanning the 2010-2022 time
Page: 2 period. The emissions are generated using a bottom-up/engineering approach which is best described as a fusion of data and modeling components. The native spatial resolution of the Vulcan FFCO2 emissions data product is a combination of points, lines, and polygons dictated primarily by the underlying data sources. The FFCO2 emissions are placed into a regularized continuous gridded 1km x 1km landscape for ease of analysis and incorporation into atmospheric transport modeling efforts. Table 1. Sector categories in the Vulcan V4.0 FFCO2 emissions data product and the abbreviation used in the filename scheme. Economic sector Abbreviation electricity production ELC onroad ONR commercial COM residential RES industrial IND nonroad NRD railroad RRD cement CMT airport AIR total TOT OUTPUT FILE NAMES AND FILE STRUCTURE Filenames provide a description of key elements of the data contained and are named as follows: v4.<sector>.co2.<domain>.<resolution>.<projection>.<hilo>.<year>.tif <sector> refers to one of the following sector designations: • tot – total emissions • air – aircraft emissions • cmt – cement emissions • cmv – commercial marine vessel emissions • com – commercial emissions • elc – electricity production emissions • ind – industrial emissions • nrd – nonroad emissions • onr – onroad emissions • res – residential emissions • rrd – railroad emissions <domain> refers to either “usa” (contiguous United States) or “ak” (Alaska). <resolution> refers to the grid spacing (e.g., “1km” for 1 km x 1 km resolution). <projection> refers to the geographical projection. Currently “lcc” or lambert conformal conic. <hilo> refers to the sensitivity case (“mn” for mean estimate, “hi” for high sensitivity case, “lo” for low sensitivity case). <year> refers to the calendar year in the range 2010 to 2022. Each file contains fossil fuel CO2 annual emissions for a given economic sector. Since the dataset is a aggregation of “native” Vulcan resolution emissions (points, polylines, polygons), the gridded data product contains annual FFCO2 emission sums of all the points, lines and polygons that lie within each 1 x 1 km cell. The units are metric tons of carbon (tC).
Page: 3 Each file is a standard GeoTIFF containing one band per file. There are two geometrical dimensions – x and y and one variable per file – annual FFCO2 emissions. There is no scaling factor nor offset applied. Coordinate system definition is embedded in the files. GRID DOMAIN AND UNITS The United States (U.S.) is divided into two spatial domains, the Contiguous U.S. and Alaska with separate filesets for each domain. The FFCO2 emissions are represented in a Lambert conformal conic projection (Table 2) and the emissions units are metric tons of carbon per year (tC/yr). Table 2. Spatial reference definitions for the gridded Vulcan V4.0 FFCO2 emissions. Parameter Value Projection Lambert_Conformal_Conic_2SP false_easting 0.00000000 false_northing 0.00000000 central_meridian -97.00000000 standard_parallel_1 33.00000000 standard_parallel_2 45.00000000 Latitude of origin 40.00000000 Linear Unit: Meter Geographic Coordinate System GCS_WGS_1984 Datum D_WGS_1984 Prime Meridian Greenwich Angular Unit Degree Text representation OGC WKT2:2019 : PROJCRS["unknown", BASEGEOGCRS["WGS 84", DATUM["World Geodetic System 1984", ELLIPSOID["WGS 84",6378137,298.257223563, LENGTHUNIT["metre",1]]], PRIMEM["Greenwich",0, ANGLEUNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433]], ID["EPSG",4326]], CONVERSION["Lambert Conic Conformal (2SP)", METHOD["Lambert Conic Conformal (2SP)", ID["EPSG",9802]], PARAMETER["Latitude of false origin",40, ANGLEUNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433], ID["EPSG",8821]], PARAMETER["Longitude of false origin",-97, ANGLEUNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433], ID["EPSG",8822]], PARAMETER["Latitude of 1st standard parallel",33, ANGLEUNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433], ID["EPSG",8823]], PARAMETER["Latitude of 2nd standard parallel",45, ANGLEUNIT["degree",0.0174532925199433], ID["EPSG",8824]], PARAMETER["Easting at false origin",0, LENGTHUNIT["metre",1], ID["EPSG",8826]], PARAMETER["Northing at false origin",0, LENGTHUNIT["metre",1], ID["EPSG",8827]]], CS[Cartesian,2], AXIS["easting",east, ORDER[1], LENGTHUNIT["metre",1,
Page: 4 ID["EPSG",9001]]], AXIS["northing",north, ORDER[2], LENGTHUNIT["metre",1, ID["EPSG",9001]]]] Table 3 shows the spatial extent, resolution and dimensions of the Contiguous U.S. and Alaska grid domains. The grid coordinates for each cell (longitude/latitude) are embedded in the GeoTIFF files. Table 3. Spatial domain definitions for the gridded Vulcan V4.0 FFCO2 emissions. Parameter Contiguous U.S. Alaska Grid resolution 1000 meter 1000 meter Minimum X (west) -2305363.04969 -5283064.20636 Minimum Y (south) -1624104.18664 2054999.51447 Maximum X (east) 2342636.95031 -1949064.20636 Maximum Y (north) 1275895.81336 4615999.51447 Number of columns 4648 3334 Number of rows 2900 2561 CHECKSUMS To ensure correct interpretation and processing of the Vulcan version 4.0 results, Table 4 provides totals for the two domains and across the economic sectors. Table 4. Checksum 2022 FFCO2 emission values for the two Vulcan V4.0 domains and economic sectors. File Contiguous U.S. (MtC) Alaska (MtC) Total (MtC) Airport 24.53695 0.57004 25.10699 Cement 17.76805 17.76805 CMV 10.20606 0.27344 10.47950 Commercial 68.85584 0.43541 69.29125 Electricity production 458.6323 0.93204 459.56434 Industrial 197.0045 6.51046 203.51496 Nonroad 50.08244 0.11689 50.19933 Onroad 401.592 0.84598 402.43798 Residential 93.99329 0.43468 94.42797 Rail 7.867436 0.01353 7.88097 Total 1330.539 10.13248 1340.67148