Robust Satellite Techniques (RST) for monitoring thermal anomalies in seismically active areas

On the basis of night-time Thermal Infrared (TIR) satellite observations, previous studies have been suggesting for decades a space-time correlation between TIR anomalies and earthquake activity. Among the various genetic models, the increase of greenhouse gas (such as CO2, CH4, etc.) emission rates, have been suggested to explain the appearance of anomalous TIR signal transients in some relation with the place and time of earthquake occurrence. In this paper the idea that an enhanced greenhouse gas emission can not be excluded among the main causes of TIR anomalies observed close to earthquake occurrence is supported by different independent observations: 1) The increase of Earth's TIR radiation to be expected as a consequence of an increase green-house gas has been evaluated by using MODTRAN Radiative Transfer code; 2) TIR anomalies observed by applying the well known Robust Satellite Technique (RST). The Boumerdes/Thenia (Algeria) earthquake (21th May 2003) has been considered in order to verify this hypothesis