Next innovation must aim at methane emissions

The next great innovation in natural gas needs to be in how methane emissions are measured and reported so the industry can get on with the job of reducing them, a session at the World Gas Conference 2022 on innovation in gas heard on May 24.

Responding to a question from moderator Timothy Egan, CEO of the Canadian Gas Association (CGA), asking about future innovations, Iman Hill, executive director of the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers, said one of the biggest challenges facing the industry today is quantifying its emissions of methane, the most potent of the greenhouse gases.

“We can use satellites, but satellite imagery doesn’t work everywhere, she said. “And I guess we can use drones. And yes, we use factors or algorithms, but actually right now we don’t have a way to actually measure, and part of that is because fugitive emissions are usually related to asset integrity issues.”
What is needed, she said, is a more holistic approach to dealing with methane – how to do better a better job of quantifying them and reporting on them. Only then can the industry work on abatement.

“At the moment, we’re not doing ourselves any favours as an industry,” she said. “We measure in different ways, we report in different ways. There are huge numbers out there but none of us actually know if they are correct or not. And if we don’t if they are correct, we don’t know if we’re reducing them. So innovation in this space is what I dream about.”

This article first appeared in the World Gas Conference 2022 daily newspaper, produced by NGW.