The US produces three times more methane emissions than it officially claims. The figure released by the US Environmental Protection Agency says it is 1% of the gas extracted in the country, however, it is estimated to be 3%. In terms of climate damage these spills are worth $9.3 billion a year, yet it is worth noting that half of this is easily preventable.
So says a study published in Nature that summarises the results of the most extensive monitoring ever conducted on methane emissions from the US oil and gas sector.
Based on aerial surveys over 10 years, it was conducted by Kairos Aerospace and the Carbon Mapper Project on the country’s major mining regions. Methane readings were thus directly measured above 52% of oil wells and 29% of gas extraction sites and associated pipelines.
The technology used is able to detect leaks exceeding 100kg of methane, while smaller ones go unnoticed. Isolated mine sites emit around 1kg of methane per hour, so the 3% estimate is the result of observations of larger leaks and estimates of methane leaks from smaller wells.