MONITORING & METERING
THE SOLUTION TO METHANE EMISSIONS IS AT OUR FINGERTIPS
Umicore Coating Service’s Mark Naples explains why methane should be a key focus, as the push to secure the tools, technologies, and methodologies needed to deliver on ambitions around reduction intensifies
D
iscussions around methane in the context of climate change have surged to the top of the agenda. For years, the conversation has been
dominated by carbon dioxide (CO2), with methane often getting lost in the agenda. Convincing regulators, stakeholders, and politicians to do something has proven difficult, largely because a simple message on methane has been beyond arms reach. However, it’s becoming increasingly clear that times – and the industry’s focus in terms of addressing greenhouse gases – are changing. Methane is a short-lived gas that persists in the atmosphere for only 10-12 years, a property that has helped it hide in plain sight for decades. Historically, humanity has taken a long-term view of emissions, but to meet our increasingly pressing climate targets, we must start to look at short- term gases that drive improvement quickly. At the COP28 climate conference in December 2023, companies representing about a third of global oil and gas production pledged to stop routine flaring of excess methane and eliminate nearly all gas leaks by the decade’s end. But how will we measure their true progress? Connecting businesses to the wider climate technology picture and documenting collective progress is key, and at Umicore Coating Services, we play a small yet fundamental role.
TACKLING THE UNSEEN February 2024 was the warmest February in the ERA5 data record, going back to 1940. Every month since last June has been the warmest compared to the same month in the series, according to the latest Climate Bulletin of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), and greenhouse gases like methane are largely to blame.
36 ENERGY & SUSTAINABILITY SOLUTIONS - Summer 2024
www.essmag.co.uk Methane emissions have about 25 times the
global warming potential of CO2, and have been responsible for around 30% of all temperature
changes over the last 200 years. As a result, it’s easy to understand the urgency of remedying the lag in tackling it across the board. Because industrial processes significantly
contribute to atmospheric methane through planned and unplanned flaring and leaks, it’s important to see methane as a reduction opportunity if we are to address global warming. While methane emissions have risen by about 25% in the past 20 years, addressing the significant disparity between the funding and
technology for methane and CO2 could reduce human-caused methane emissions by as much
as 45% within a decade. To manage methane emissions, you need to
pinpoint their origin and, perhaps most crucially, quantify their form, flow rate and concentrations. The key wins will come from plugging available technology into new and existing infrastructure and articulating value for the person deploying the latest equipment on-site. A report released by the International Energy Agency (IEA) in October 2023 found that rapid cuts in methane emissions from fossil fuels could avoid up to 0.1˚C in global temperature rise by
The oil and gas industry is responsible for approximately 60% of all
anthropogenic methane emissions, about half of which come from flaring and methane released during operations
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