Global proliferation of offshore gas flaring areas

The long-term venting and combustion of offshore associated gas have substantial adverse effects on the ecological environment, so characterizing the global proliferation of offshore gas flaring areas is very important for marine environmental protection and climate change research. However, the use of a single fire/light remote sensing product makes it difficult to conduct long-term observations. In this study, we detected global offshore gas flaring areas during the 27-year interval from 1992 to 2018, using temporal and spatial complementarity of six different remote sensing data products, which are as follows: DMSP-OLS Nighttime Lights; (A)ATSRs; MODIS and VIIRS active fire products; and VIIRS Night Fire and Nighttime Light. Our aim was to achieve more comprehensive extraction results and to analyze a longer time-interval than has been attempted previously. In addition, the resulting map of the global proliferation of offshore gas flaring areas enables their locational and temporal characteristics to be visualized.