Deemed largest emitter of methane gas, Turkmenistan could be star of COP28 [Gas in Transition]

The Gates of Hell is a real place. Located near the Turkmen village of Darvaza in the Karakum Desert, the 70-mwide Darvaza gas crater has been burning since 1971 when it was deliberately set alight by Soviet geologists after they had accidently drilled into an underground cavern filled with natural gas. The gas discovery resulted with the ground beneath the drilling rig collapsing into the cavern and creating a huge crater. Fearful of the large amounts of gas that was seeping from the crater and leaking into the atmosphere, the geologists set the gas alight, expecting that it would burn out sometime thereafter. But 50 year later, the Gates of Hell, as it has come to be known, continues to burn bright enough to be seen from space.

The Darvaza crater is probably the largest gas flare in the world and numerous efforts have been made to extinguish it, but to no avail. In January 2022, Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimukhamedov ordered experts to find a way to put the fire out. It still burns.

In the coming months, Turkmenistan’s new President Serdar Berdimukhamedov (son of Gurbanguly), may find himself ordering more experts to find a way to halt all the methane emissions the country is allowed to escape.

Earlier this year, citing the Quebec-based satellite monitoring company GHGSat, Gas Pathways reported that Turkmenistan accounted for over half of the world’s oil and gas methane emissions during 2021. According to GHGSat, Asia accounted for 69% of global emissions and of that, Turkmenistan contributed 79%, making it responsible for 51% of global methane emissions.

 The information gathered by Kayrros for the Guardian said Turkmenistan emitted more than 5mn tons of methane in 2021 and slightly more than 4mn tons in 2022. Those emissions came from more than 800 ‘events’ (leaking wells and pipelines) recorded by satellite during 2019-2022. Gas fields in the western side of the country emitted 2.6mn tons of methane in 2022, according to the data, while fields in eastern Turkmenistan emitted 1.8mn tons. The report said that together, the country emitted the equivalent of 366mn tons of carbon dioxide.

In many cases, especially in the western fields, flares burning the methane have been turned off and the methane left to vent into the atmosphere. Those discussing the situation with Turkmen leaders have tried to point out that capturing the flared or vented gas would provide the country with additional gas volumes that could be sold. Perhaps the question might be: where to sell it?

According to some experts interviewed by the Guardian, it would not be difficult to stop the country’s methane emissions. Because the gas reserves are so huge, it appears that the authorities “never cared,” they said.

Huge resource, no resolve

Turkmenistan has one of the largest reserves of natural gas in the world. It claims to have the fourth largest. It has trillions of cubic metres of natural gas reserves, but virtually all of it lies beneath vast arid plains or remote deserts with little access to markets.

 According to the BP Statistical Review 2022, Turkmenistan has natural gas reserves of 13.6 trillion cubic meters, or 480.3 trillion cubic feet. During 2022, the country produced 79.3 bcm and consumed 36.7 bcm. At least 30 bcm of the remainder was exported to China.

Europe has long been interested in gaining access to Turkmen gas. The first attempt was in the early 1990s shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union when Alexander Haig, a US general who had been the commander of NATO and a Secretary of State under Ronald Reagan, visited then Turkmen President Saparmurat Niyazov and proposed that Turkmen gas be exported to Turkey via a pipeline through northern Iran.

That proposal failed, but by the late 1990s and early 2000s, European companies and politicians frequently visited Niyazov to promote a gas pipeline across the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan and from there to Europe via the proposed Southern Gas Corridor. Those ideas and agreements fell flat. Today, Turkmenistan’s main export route is across the Trans-Asia Pipeline to China, to which it supplies some 30bn m3/yr and hopes to sell more. During the Central Asia-China summit in Xi’an on May 18-19 this year, current President Serdar Berdimukhamedov proposed the continuing joint implementation of energy projects by Turkmenistan and China.

In the past, Turkmenistan had sold large amounts of gas to Russia, which then sold it on to Ukraine. It also sold gas to Iran, but disagreements between the two states caused a fall in the volume of gas exported to the southern neighbour. For 20 years there has been talk of a Turkmen-Afghan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline, but... Instead, tanker trucks have recently begun to deliver liquefied natural gas (LPG) to Pakistan through Afghanistan via Kandahar. Fifty tankers, each carrying 30 tons, are involved.

 Only a few foreign companies have been permitted to work onshore Turkmenistan, where state-owned Turkmenneft and Turkmengaz are in control. Dubai-based Dragon Oil and Malaysia’s Petronas work offshore in the Caspian Sea. Italy’s Eni is active and also the companies that are involved with the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), which is the only foreign company with direct access to Turkmenistan’s onshore gas fields.

There is from time to time a report about a new plan to export Turkmen gas somewhere, but those plans never seen to pan out. Only the big gas development in eastern Turkmenistan and the gas pipeline to China has succeeded. And at this point, while Turkmenistan could certainly fill much of the gap created in Europe by the halt in Russian gas shipments, it is unlikely that the EU – with its plans for pushing through an energy transition – would be willing to finance the development and infrastructure investment that would be needed to transport Turkmen gas to Europe.

Phase out methane by 2030

The UN Climate Change Conference COP28 will take place in Abu Dhabi, capital of the oil and gas-producing giant the UAE later this year, where carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) is expected to be the centrepiece of discussion. COP28 president-designate is Sultan al Jaber, who currently serves as UAE Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, and is the Managing Director and Group CEO for the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC); and he is the UAE Special Envoy for Climate Change. Jaber has made methane elimination and carbon capture the priorities of his tenure.

Speaking in Abu Dhabi in early May at the inaugural UAE Climate Tech conference, Jaber called for the oil and gas industry to phase out methane emissions by 2030. “If we are serious about curbing industrial emissions,” he said, “we need to get serious about carbon capture technologies.”

Clearly, from the information available about methane leaks in Turkmenistan, the reclusive, if not outright paranoid, country would be a good place to start. Ashgabat has never been keen to allow foreign energy companies into the country, and that could be the reason why so much of its oil and gas remains underground and un-exported. It might also indicate why so much methane is simply vented or flared. Turkmenneft and Turkmengaz operate most of the onshore extraction facilities, many of which remain chained to Soviet-era technology and are poorly maintained.

Ashgabat has been under pressure for some time to stop the leaks. At COP26 in Glasgow in 2021, then deputy chair of the cabinet, Serdar Berdimukhamedov (he took over from his father Gulbanguly on 19 March 2022), told the conference that Turkmenistan was giving special attention to reducing methane emissions. But while the data shows that perhaps some effort has been made between 2021 and 2022, much remains to be addressed. Turkmenistan tops the bad gas list by far.

President Serdar has also welcomed the Global Methane Pledge, but has failed to sign the accord, while 150 other countries have. Furthermore, Turkmenneft and Turkmengaz have not joined the voluntary UN initiative to reduce leaks, the Oil and Gas Methane Partnership.

Turkmenistan has good ties with the UAE and the two countries have recently entered an agreement to jointly further develop another giant gas field, Galkynysh, gas from which might possibly be used to feed a TAPI pipeline. Observers have speculated that with Sultan al Jaber being the head of ADNOC, he might be able to convince the Turkmen government and its companies to take action and stop the leaks that are doing so much environmental damage. It would be a big step to make good on his desire to see methane emissions come to a stop by 2030. Some suggest that COP28 might actually force the issue.

This one country alone might prove to be the test of Jaber’s success as COP28 president. Many diplomats, officials and executives have talked to Turkmenistan about many things over the years, but there has not been all that much action on any of the things discussed. What it shows is that Turkmenistan only does something when it really wants to do it.