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Sudhanshu Pandey

Photo of Sudhanshu Pandey

Address:

4800 Oak Grove Drive

Pasadena, CA 91109

Curriculum Vitae:

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Member of:

Tropospheric Composition

Scientist

Biography

Dr. Sudhanshu Pandey is a Scientist in the Earth Science Section at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and serves as Methane Modeling Lead for the U.S. Greenhouse Gas Center. His research combines satellite remote sensing with atmospheric inverse modeling to quantify and attribute greenhouse gas emissions CO₂ and methane at scales from individual point sources to the global carbon cycle.

He developed satellite-derived whole-atmosphere CO₂ growth-rate methods now adopted in the Global Carbon Project workflow (Pandey et al. 2024, AGU Advances; Pandey et al. 2025, Nature Communications; Pandey 2025, AGU Advances), and led the first satellite detection of an unreported extreme methane leak, helping catalyze remote-sensing-based methane plume detection (Pandey et al. 2019, PNAS). His work spans multi-scale emissions quantification, Bayesian data assimilation, and physics-informed machine learning applied to EMIT, GOSAT, OCO-2/3, and TROPOMI satellite observations.

Dr. Pandey received his Ph.D. in Physics from Utrecht University (2017) and held a research position at SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research (2017–2022) before joining JPL.

Education

  • Ph.D., Physics, Utrecht University, 2017
  • BS-MS, Earth Sciences - Indian Institute of Science Education & Research, Kolkata, India, 2012

Professional Experience

  • Research Scientist - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (2022 - Present)
  • Research Scientist - SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research (2017 - 2022)

Community Service

  • Reviewer for scientific journals.
  • Reviewer for research proposals.
  • Mentoring students.

Research Interests

  • Satellite remote sensing: Multi-mission synthesis of CH₄ and CO₂ retrievals from satellite observations.
  • Emissions detection and quantification: Point-source to regional-scale methane and CO₂ emission estimates from satellite and airborne observations.
  • Bayesian inverse modeling: inversion of atmospheric measurements to attribute greenhouse gas sources and sinks
  • Machine learning: Physics-informed ML approaches for atmospheric transport improvement and automated emissions detection.
  • Carbon-cycle monitoring: Low-latency, satellite-derived CO₂ growth-rate diagnostics for near-real-time global carbon budget attribution.

Selected Publications

  1. Ciais, P., et al. (2026). Low latency global carbon budget indicates reduced land carbon sink in the year 2024. National Science Review, 13(2), nwaf594. https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwaf594
  2. Varon, D. J., et al. (2025). Seasonality and declining intensity of methane emissions from the Permian and nearby U.S. oil and gas basins. Environmental Science & Technology, 60(1), 425–435. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.5c08745
  3. Friedlingstein, P., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2025). Global Carbon Budget 2025. Earth System Science Data Discussions [preprint]. https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-659
  4. Dasgupta, B., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2025). Harmonisation of methane isotope ratio measurements from different laboratories using atmospheric samples. Atmospheric Measurement Techniques, 18, 6591–6607. https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-6591-2025
  5. Pandey, S. (2025). Taking Earth's Carbon Pulse from Space. AGU Advances. https://doi.org/10.1029/2025AV002085
  6. Pandey, S., et al. (2025). Reduction in Earth's Carbon Budget Imbalance. Nature Communications, 16, 6818. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-61588-2
  7. Bilir, E., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2025). Satellite-constrained reanalysis reveals CO₂ versus climate-process compensation across the global land carbon sink. AGU Advances. https://doi.org/10.1029/2025AV001689
  8. Pandey, S., et al. (2025). Relating Multi-Scale Plume Detection and Area Estimates of Methane Emissions: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis. Environmental Science & Technology, 59(16), 7931–7947. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.4c07415
  9. Albuhaisi, A., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2025). Integrating Satellite Observations and Hydrological Models to Unravel Large TROPOMI Methane Emissions in South Sudan Wetlands. Remote Sensing, 16, 4744. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs16244744
  10. Pandey, S., et al. (2024). Toward low-latency estimation of atmospheric CO₂ growth rates using satellite observations: Evaluating sampling errors of satellite and in situ observing approaches. AGU Advances, 5, e2023AV001145. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023AV001145
  11. Varon, D. J., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2024). Quantifying NOₓ point sources with Landsat and Sentinel-2 satellite observations of NO₂ plumes. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 121, e2317077121. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2317077121
  12. Byrne, B., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2024). Carbon emissions from the 2023 Canadian wildfires. Nature, 633, 835–839. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07878-z
  13. Pandey, S., et al. (2023). Daily detection and quantification of methane leaks using Sentinel-3: A tiered satellite observation approach with Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-5P. Remote Sensing of Environment, 296, 113716. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2023.113716
  14. Schuit, B. J., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2023). Automated detection and monitoring of methane super-emitters using satellite data. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 23, 9071–9098. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-9071-2023
  15. Worden, J. R., Pandey, S., et al. (2023). Verifying methane inventories and trends with atmospheric methane data. AGU Advances, 4. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023AV000871
  16. Naus, S., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2023). Assessing the relative importance of satellite-detected methane super-emitters in quantifying total emissions for oil and gas production areas in Algeria. Environmental Science & Technology. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.3c04746
  17. Varon, D. J., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2023). Continuous weekly monitoring of methane emissions from the Permian Basin by inversion of TROPOMI satellite observations. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 23, 7503–7520. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-7503-2023
  18. Maasakkers, J. D., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2022). Reconstructing and quantifying methane emissions from the full duration of a 38-day natural gas well blowout using space-based observations. Remote Sensing of Environment, 270, 112755. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2021.112755
  19. Maasakkers, J. D., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2022). Using satellites to uncover large methane emissions from landfills. Science Advances, 8, 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abn9683
  20. Sadavarte, P., Pandey, S., et al. (2022). A high-resolution gridded inventory of coal mine methane emissions for India and Australia. Elementa, 10, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1525/elementa.2021.00056
  21. Pandey, S., et al. (2022). Order-of-magnitude wall-time improvement of variational methane inversions by physical parallelization: A demonstration using TM5-4DVAR. Geoscientific Model Development, 15, 4555–4567. https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-15-4555-2022
  22. Pandey, S., et al. (2021). Using satellite data to identify the methane emission controls of South Sudan's wetlands. Biogeosciences, 18, 557–572. https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-18-557-2021
  23. Cusworth, D. H., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2021). Multi-satellite imaging of a gas well blowout enables quantification of total methane emissions. Geophysical Research Letters, 48(2), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL090864
  24. Sadavarte, P., Pandey, S., et al. (2021). Methane emissions from super-emitting coal mines in Australia quantified using TROPOMI satellite observations. Environmental Science & Technology, 55(24), 16573–16580. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.1c03976
  25. Mazzini, A., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2021). Relevant methane emission to the atmosphere from a geological gas manifestation. Scientific Reports. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-83369-9
  26. Ma, S., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2021). Satellite constraints on the latitudinal distribution and temperature sensitivity of wetland methane emissions. AGU Advances, 2(3), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021AV000408
  27. Zhang, Y., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2020). Quantifying methane emissions from the largest oil-producing basin in the United States from space. Science Advances. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aaz5120
  28. Pandey, S., et al. (2019). Satellite observations reveal extreme methane leakage from a natural gas well blowout. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(52), 26376–26381. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1908712116
  29. Pandey, S., et al. (2019). Influence of atmospheric transport on estimates of variability in the global methane burden. Geophysical Research Letters, 46, 2302–2311. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL081092
  30. Ganesan, A. L., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2019). Advancing scientific understanding of the global methane budget in support of the Paris Agreement. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 33(12), 1475–1512. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GB006065
  31. Varon, D. J., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2019). Satellite discovery of anomalously large methane point sources from oil/gas production. Geophysical Research Letters. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL083798
  32. Worden, J. R., ..., Pandey, S.,et al. (2017). Reduced biomass burning emissions reconcile conflicting estimates of the post-2006 atmospheric methane budget. Nature Communications, 8, 2227. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-02246-0
  33. Bruhwiler, L. M., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2017). U.S. CH₄ emissions from oil and gas production: Have recent large increases been detected? Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 122(7), 4070–4083. https://doi.org/10.1002/2016JD026157
  34. Pandey, S., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2017). Enhanced methane emissions from tropical wetlands during the 2011 La Niña. Scientific Reports, 7. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep45759
  35. Pandey, S., ..., Pandey, S., et al. (2016). Inverse modeling of GOSAT-retrieved ratios of total column CH₄ and CO₂ for 2009 and 2010. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 16(8), 5043–5062. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-5043-2016

Projects

OCO-2 - Orbiting Carbon Observatory
CMS Flux (Carbon Monitoring System Flux)
OCO-3 - Orbiting Carbon Observatory 3
TROPESS