A new study published today in Environmental Science and Technology, led by Carbon Mapper Project Scientist Dan Cusworth, identified more than 1,000 high emission point sources of the potent greenhouse gas methane from the Permian Basin oilfield and found that about half of these sources are likely to be malfunctioning oilfield equipment. If the most persistent leaks – only 147 sources – in this newfound group were repaired, methane emissions in the region would drop by 56 metric tons an hour. That’s equivalent to about 9% of total methane emissions from oil and gas production in the entire United States, according to estimates from the Environmental Protection agency.
New Study Identifies Methane Super – Emitters in Largest U.S. Oilfield
Published on: Jun 3, 2021
Recent Posts
- Study finds landfill point source emissions have an outsized impact and opportunity to tackle U.S. waste methane
- Analysis of 1M aerial measurements reveals insights from oil and gas production in key regions
- Data Dispatch: Repeat Observations of Global Waste Methane Sources
- Carbon Mapper Share New Data Portal and Research Insights at 2023 AGU Fall Meeting
- Carbon Mapper Launches New Data Portal – Unlocking New Insights and Accessibility
Tags
aerial agu airborne arizona state university ASU bloomberg philanthropies carbon carbon mapper climate climate tech climatetech climate week co2 CO2 data data emissions emissions data flaring global airborne observatory insights landfill landfills measurement methane methane data methane emissions methane point source mitigation NASA JPL news oil and gas Planet remote sensing research RMI satellite satellites science space spectrometer stanford study technology waste sector
Archives
Categories
Definitions
Point source methane emissions
Point source methane emissions generally refer to discrete sources such as components of infrastructure or a facility that emit large plumes of concentrated methane. Examples include leaking gas pipelines, venting coal mines, or a leak in a landfill gas capture system.
Area source methane emissions
Area source methane emissions refer to sources that emit methane across a wide area. This can include a single large but diffuse source (like wetlands) or a collection of thousands of small sources across a wide area (like marginal wells).
def: Facility Scale
When we say “facility scale,” we mean that the technology Carbon Mapper uses to spot methane emissions can show exactly where emissions are coming from down to the level of a specific facility (like a production plant) or, in some cases, a piece of equipment (like a tank battery). We’ll dig deeper into this topic in a future post.
def: Facility Scale
When we say “facility scale,” we mean that the technology Carbon Mapper uses to spot methane emissions can show exactly where emissions are coming from down to the level of a specific facility (like a production plant) or, in some cases, a piece of equipment (like a tank battery). We’ll dig deeper into this topic in a future post.