CSU joins national study on methane emissions

Colorado State University researchers are joining a national scientific team to evaluate methane emissions from natural gas production.

The study is sponsored by the Environmental Defense Fund and the natural gas industry and is an effort to generate additional data on methane emissions from natural gas production, according to CSU.

The study will measure methane emissions linked to the country’s natural gas pipeline and storage system. CSU mechanical engineering profession Bryan Willson and researcher Dan Zimmerle will begin collecting data this month. Results of the nationwide field study are expected early in 2014.

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“The primary component of natural gas, methane, is a greenhouse gas many times more potent than carbon dioxide when released into the atmosphere uncombusted,” Willson said in a statement.

“So, understanding how much methane leaks at various points along the supply chain, including the transmission and storage segment, is critical to discerning the potential of natural gas to offer climate benefits in various fuel-switching scenarios.”

According to a report by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, natural gas production systems account for 25 percent of U.S. methane emissions.

“This study will provide an additional, independent assessment for the transmission and storage sector that can be linked to other studies to allow an accurate, impartial, peer-reviewed and scientifically published estimate of leakage throughout the entire ‘well-to-burner tip’ supply chain,” Willson said.

Sponsors for the study include the Environmental Defense Fund, Dow Chemical, the Interstate Natural Gas Association and Kinder Morgan, among others.

The study will evaluate existing data as well as new data collected this summer and fall.

The study will be reviewed by a special panel of professors and industry experts, who will evaluate the methodologies, the model, the statistical methods used and the results.