Approaches to characterizing methane emission at an industrial facility using an unmanned air vehicle (UAV) equipped with navigational instruments and methane gas sensors. A scan area associated with the industrial facility is defined. The scan area can be logically partitioned into a plurality of pixels based on information provided by an intelligent agent. A flight plan for a flight of the UAV can be created to cover the pixels of the scan area. The UAV can execute the flight plan and collect time-series navigational data and time-series sensor data as the UAV executes the flight plan. The flight path of the UAV can be dynamically adjusted during the flight by an agent to ensure that the flight path of the UAV covers the scan area. A two-dimensional (2D) image of methane concentration over the scan area can be constructed from the time-series navigational data and the time-series sensor data.