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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">ESSDD</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>Earth System Science Data Discussions</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">ESSDD</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss.</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<publisher><publisher-name></publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/essd-2026-831</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>High precision atmospheric GHG measurements for the Orinoco region: The Villavicencio Tower (VLO)</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Hantson</surname>
<given-names>Stijn</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff4">
<sup>4</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Botía</surname>
<given-names>Santiago</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5447-3968</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff4">
<sup>4</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Navarro-Ramírez</surname>
<given-names>Miguel Ángel</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Pardo-Buitrago</surname>
<given-names>Diego</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Fernandes Amaral</surname>
<given-names>João</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wagh</surname>
<given-names>Shrutika</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0009-0007-3648-2127</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Ramírez-Niño</surname>
<given-names>Miguel Ángel</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Gutierrez-Rincon</surname>
<given-names>Anghy</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0016-5599</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Salamanca</surname>
<given-names>Mauricio</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Jordan</surname>
<given-names>Armin</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Knabe</surname>
<given-names>Steffen</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>El Madany</surname>
<given-names>Tarek</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0726-7141</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Kuebler</surname>
<given-names>Karl</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3502-8698</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Moossen</surname>
<given-names>Heiko</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Rothe</surname>
<given-names>Michael</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Rödenbeck</surname>
<given-names>Christian</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6011-6249</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Zaehle</surname>
<given-names>Sönke</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5602-7956</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Sierra</surname>
<given-names>Carlos</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0009-4169</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Escuela de Ciencias e Ingeniería, Universidad del Rosario, Bogotá, Colombia</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff3">
<label>3</label>
<addr-line>Universidad de los Llanos, Villavicencio, Colombia</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff4">
<label>4</label>
<addr-line>These authors contributed equally to this work.</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>09</day>
<month>11</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2026</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>17</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2026 Stijn Hantson et al.</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2026</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://essd.copernicus.org/preprints/essd-2026-831/">This article is available from https://essd.copernicus.org/preprints/essd-2026-831/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://essd.copernicus.org/preprints/essd-2026-831/essd-2026-831.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://essd.copernicus.org/preprints/essd-2026-831/essd-2026-831.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>Understanding the dynamics of natural and anthropogenic sources and sinks of greenhouse gases (GHG) is key to projecting anthropogenic climate change and detecting potential climate-carbon feedbacks. While our understanding of the sources and sinks has increased considerably over the past decades, much of the progress has focused on extratropical ecosystems, leaving large parts of the tropics understudied. Tropical ecosystems are assumed to be important carbon sinks and significant sources of methane, but much of the temporal and spatial heterogeneity and trends are still poorly understood. Observational efforts have largely concentrated on key tropical regions such as the Amazon Basin, whereas other tropical areas remain sparsely monitored with in-situ measurements. In particular, northern South America&amp;mdash;despite being identified by bottom-up and top-down models as a significant contributor to global GHG budgets&amp;mdash;currently lacks atmospheric observations to evaluate these estimates or resolve their spatial and temporal variability. To address this observational gap, here we present the establishment of the Villavicencio Tower (VLO) for atmospheric GHG measurements to provide additional constraints on GHG emission estimates across northern South America. This 26 m tower is located within the Orinoco lowlands, close to the Andean foothills in Colombia. Due to the predominantly easterly winds in the region, the footprint covers the Orinoco basin and the northern Amazon. Weekly duplicated flask measurements are taken, and laboratory analysis of trace gases (CO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;, CH&lt;sub&gt;4&lt;/sub&gt;, CO, N&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;O, SF&lt;sub&gt;6&lt;/sub&gt;, H&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;) and the stable isotope composition of CO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; (&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C and &lt;sup&gt;18&lt;/sup&gt;O) and CH&lt;sub&gt;4&lt;/sub&gt; (&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C and &lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt;H) are performed, as well as O&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;/N&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; and Ar/N&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;. The tower started operating on 20 June 2023 and here we present the first 21 months of data. Time series of all measurements are presented as well as a discussion regarding uncertainties. These measurements will allow for improved estimates of GHG emissions across northern South America and to detect long-range transport across the Amazon to the Orinoco river basin.</p>
</abstract>
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