US LNG exporter Cheniere has joined forces with five natural gas producers and academic institutions to work on measuring greenhouse gas emissions.
Cheniere and partners are planning to implement quantification, monitoring, reporting and verification of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions performance at natural gas production sites.
The partners plan to improve the overall understanding of upstream GHG emissions and further the deployment of advanced monitoring technologies and protocols, Cheniere said in a statement.
Moreover, the move would also support Cheniere’s climate strategy initiatives, including the company’s plan to provide LNG cargo emissions tags to customers beginning in 2022.
Collaboration with gas producers
The producers participating in the project include Aethon Energy, Ascent Resources – Utica, EQT Corporation, Indigo Natural Resources and Pioneer Natural Resources.
“Collaboration with our natural gas suppliers is a key component of Cheniere’s focus on quantifying and improving environmental performance,” said Jack Fusco, CEO of Cheniere..
“This collaboration reinforces our data-driven environmental transparency, supports our CE Tags and enhances our efforts with natural gas suppliers to monitor and verify emissions to maximize the climate benefits of Cheniere’s LNG,” he said.
According to Cheniere, this collaborative R&D initiative will utilize multiple ground-based, drone, aerial, and satellite monitoring technologies to establish baseline emissions levels.
Furthermore, the project will monitor sites for carbon dioxide and for both fugitive and vented methane emissions.
The initiative will also verify emissions performance and identify opportunities to reduce emissions.
The initial effort will cover production wells in the Haynesville, Marcellus, Permian and Utica basins that collectively produce approximately 360 million standard cubic feet per day of natural gas, as well as multiple tank batteries.
Researchers and monitoring technology providers
A unit of Cheniere leads the project. The project is supported by researchers from the Payne Institute for Public Policy at the Colorado School of Mines, Harrisburg University of Science and Technology, SLR International.
Also, other emissions monitoring technology providers, including Montrose Environmental, SeekOps, Bridger Photonics, and GHGSat will work on the project as well.
The QMRV R&D collaboration will also assess the technical and policy considerations related to GHG emissions management at production sites, including the scalability and the efficacy of a robust QMRV program and monitoring technologies, Cheniere said.