Bridge Out: Study Finds Methane Emissions From Natural Gas Production Higher Than EPA

[ScienceRocks]

Bridge Out: Study Finds Methane Emissions From Natural Gas Production Higher Than EPA Estimates
Fugitive Methane and New Research | The Energy Collective

A major new study blows up the whole notion of natural gas as a short-term bridge fuel to a carbon-free economy.

Natural gas is mostly methane (CH4), a potent heat-trapping gas. If, as now seems likely, natural gas production systems leak 2.7% (or more), then gas-fired power loses its near-term advantage over coal and becomes more of a gangplank than a bridge. Worse, without a carbon price, some gas displaces renewable energy, further undercutting any benefit it might have had.

Fifteen scientists from some of the leading institutions in the world — including Harvard, NOAA and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab — have published a seminal study, “Anthropogenic emissions of methane in the United States.” Crucially, it is based on “comprehensive atmospheric methane observations, extensive spatial datasets, and a high-resolution atmospheric transport model,” rather than the industry-provided numbers EPA uses.

Indeed, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study by Scot Miller et al takes the unusual step of explicitly criticizing the EPA:


The US EPA recently decreased its CH4 emission factors for fossil fuel extraction and processing by 25–30% (for 1990–2011), but we find that CH4 data from across North America instead indicate the need for a larger adjustment of the opposite sign.

D’oh!

How much larger? The study found greenhouse gas emissions from “fossil fuel extraction and processing (i.e., oil and/or natural gas) are likely a factor of two or greater than cited in existing studies.” In particular, they concluded, “regional methane emissions due to fossil fuel extraction and processing could be 4.9 ± 2.6 times larger than in EDGAR, the most comprehensive global methane inventory.”

This suggests the methane leakage rate from natural gas production, which EPA recently decreased to about 1.5%, is in fact 3% or higher.

If this is so then the left is going to have to accept some FORM OF NUCLEAR. I support wind, solar, wave and hydro-thermal but it isn't going to do it.

 

[chikenwing]

Good thing you don't use any natural gas at all right?

 

[Mr. H.]

Don't be such a whore, Matthew...

Three Key Facts about New Methane Paper

 

[CrusaderFrank]

You know methane is natural gas, right?

 

[RGR]

This suggests the methane leakage rate from natural gas production, which EPA recently decreased to about 1.5%, is in fact 3% or higher.

If this is so then the left is going to have to accept some FORM OF NUCLEAR. I support wind, solar, wave and hydro-thermal but it isn't going to do it.

Good thing we have plenty of natural gas then! Better yet, if those wild and crazy roustabouts would just tighten up those hammer unions one more quarter turn, this problem is SOLVED.

 

[waltky]

Finding methane gas leaks with Google Street View Maps...

Google Street View Cars Map Methane Leaks
August 03, 2017 — Finding underground gas leaks is now as easy as finding a McDonalds, thanks to a combination of Google Street View cars, mobile methane detectors, some major computing power and a lot of ingenuity.

When a city’s underground gas lines leak, they waste fuel and release invisible plumes of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. To find and measure leaks, Colorado State University biologist Joe von Fischer decided to create "methane maps," to make it easier for utilities to identify the biggest leaks, and repair them. “That’s where you get the greatest bang for the buck," he pointed out, "the greatest pollution reductions per repair.” Knowing that Google Maps start with Google Street View cars recording everything they drive by, along with their GPS locations, von Fischer’s team thought they would just add methane detectors to a Street View car. It turned out, it was not that simple.

"Squirrelly objects"

The world’s best methane detectors are accurate in an area the size of a teacup, but methane leaks can be wider than a street. Also, no one had ever measured the size of a methane leak from a moving car. "If you’ve ever seen a plume of smoke, it’s sort of a lumpy, irregular object," von Fischer said. "Methane plumes as they come out of the ground are the same, they’re lumpy squirrelly objects.”

This portable methane analyzer uses laser-based technology to measure atmospheric methane concentrations, the same technology used in the analyzers that are deployed on the Google Street View cars.​

The team had to develop a way to capture data about those plumes, one that would be accurate in the real world. They set up a test site in an abandoned airfield near campus, and brought in what looked like a large scuba tank filled with methane and some air hoses. Then they released carefully measured methane through the hose as von Fischer drove a specially equipped SUV past it, again and again. They compared readings from the methane detectors in the SUV to readings from the tank. “We spend a lot of time driving through the plumes to sort of calibrate the way that those cars see methane plumes that form as methane’s being emitted from the ground,” von Fischer explained. With that understanding, the methane detectors hit the road.

Turning data into maps

But the results created pages of data, "more than 30 million points,” said CSU computer scientist Johnson Kathkikiaran. He knew that all those data points alone would never help people find the biggest leaks on any map. So he and his advisor, Sanmi Peracara, turned the data into pictures using tools from Google. Their visual summaries made it easy for utility experts to analyze the methane maps, but von Fischer wanted anyone to be able to identify the worst leaks. His teammates at the Environmental Defense Fund met that challenge by incorporating the data into their online maps. Yellow dots indicate a small methane leak. Orange is a medium-size one. Red means a big leak - as much pollution as one car driving 14,000 kilometers in a single day.

Colored circles on the methane maps indicate the size of the detected gas leak.​

Von Fischer says that if a city focuses on these biggest leaks, repairing just 8 percent of them can reduce methane pollution by a third. “That becomes a win-win type scenario," he said, "because we’re not asking polluters to fix everything, but we’re looking for a reduction in overall emissions, and I think we can achieve that in a more cost effective way.” After analyzing a methane map for the state of New Jersey, for example, the utility PSE&G has prioritized fixing its leakiest pipes there first, to speed the reduction of their overall pollution. “To me that was a real victory, to be able to help the utility find which parts were leakiest, and to make a cost effective reduction in their overall emissions," von Fishcher said. Von Fischer envisions even more innovation ahead for mapping many kinds of pollution… to clean the air and save energy.

Google Street View Cars Map Methane Leaks

 

[RGR]

Bridge Out: Study Finds Methane Emissions From Natural Gas Production Higher Than EPA Estimates
Fugitive Methane and New Research | The Energy Collective

This suggests the methane leakage rate from natural gas production, which EPA recently decreased to about 1.5%, is in fact 3% or higher.

If this is so then the left is going to have to accept some FORM OF NUCLEAR. I support wind, solar, wave and hydro-thermal but it isn't going to do it.

The giveaway in this article as an advocacy piece is contained here:

"Finally, natural gas makes little sense as a short-term sustainability play, since we know that each fracked well consumes staggering amounts of water, much of which is rendered permanently unfit for human use and reinjected into the ground where it can taint even more ground water in the coming decades."