Sensitivity of detection of fugitive methane emissions from coal seam gas fields

There is increasing recognition that minimising methane emissions from the oil and gas sector is a key step in reducing global greenhouse gas emissions in the near term. Atmospheric monitoring techniques are likely to play an important future role in measuring the extent of existing emissions and verifying emission reductions. They can be very suitable for monitoring gas fields as they are continuous and integrate emissions from a number of potential point and diffuse sources that may vary in time.


Geoscience Australia and CSIRO Marine & Atmospheric Research have collected three years of continuous methane and carbon dioxide measurements at their atmospheric composition monitoring station ('Arcturus') in the Bowen Basin, Australia. Methane signals in the Bowen Basin are likely to be influenced by cattle production, landfill, coal production, and conventional and coal seam gas (CSG) production.


Australian CSG is typically 'dry' and is characterised by a mixed thermogenic-biogenic methane source with an absence of C3-C6+ alkanes. The range of '13C isotopic signatures of the CSG is similar to methane from landfill gas and cattle emissions. The absence of standard in-situ tracers for CSG fugitive emissions suggests that having a comprehensive baseline will be critical for successful measurement of fugitive emissions using atmospheric techniques.


In this paper we report on the sensitivity of atmospheric techniques for the detection of fugitive emissions from a simulated new CSG field against a three year baseline signal. Simulation of emissions was performed for a 1-year period using the coupled prognostic meteorological and air pollution model TAPM at different fugitive emission rates (i.e. estimates of <1% to up to 10% of production lost) and distances (i.e. 10 - 50 km) from the station. Emissions from the simulated CSG field are based on well density, production volumes, and field size typical of CSG fields in Australia. The distributions of the perturbed and baseline signals were evaluated and statistically compared to test for the presence of fugitive methane emissions. In addition, a time series model of the methane baseline was developed in order to generate alternative realizations of the baseline signal. These were used to provide measures of both the likelihood of detecting fugitive emissions at various emission levels and of the false alarm rate. Results of the statistical analysis and an indicative minimum fugitive methane emission rate that can be detected using a single monitoring station are presented.


Poster presented at the American Geophysical Union meeting, December 2013, San Francisco

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Identification info

Date (Publication)
2013-01-01T00:00:00
Citation identifier
Geoscience Australia Persistent Identifier/https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/78546

Cited responsible party
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Publisher

American Geophysical Union

 San Francisco
Author

Feitz, A.J.

 1
Author

Wilson, P.

 2
Author

Berko, H.

 3
Author

Jenkins, C.

 4
Author

Loh, Z.

 5
Author

Spencer, D.

 6
Author

Etheridge, D.

 7
Name

AGU Fall Meeting 2013, 9-13 December 2013

Point of contact
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Custodian

ED
Owner

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)
Custodian

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

 Voice
Topic category
  • Climatology, meteorology, atmosphere

Extent

N
S
E
W


Maintenance and update frequency
As needed

Resource format

Title

Product data repository: Various Formats

Website

Data Store directory containing the digital product files

Data Store directory containing one or more files, possibly in a variety of formats, accessible to Geoscience Australia staff only for internal purposes

Keywords

  • GA Publication

  • Poster/Image

Theme

  • atmosphere

Theme

  • greenhouse gas emissions

Theme

  • climate

Keywords

  • AU-QLD

Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC)

  • Atmospheric Sciences

Keywords

  • Published_External

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Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence

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CC-BY

Edition

4.0

Website

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/

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License
Use constraints
License

Resource constraints

Title

Australian Government Security ClassificationSystem

Edition date
2018-11-01T00:00:00
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https://www.protectivesecurity.gov.au/Pages/default.aspx

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Unclassified
Language
English
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UTF8

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Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

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OnLine resource

Download the file (pdf)

Download the file (pdf)

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  • pdf

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Statement

Product from Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute internship and data from GA_CSIRO Atmospheric Baseline Station (Arcturus)

Hierarchy level
Non geographic dataset
Other

GA Publication

Description

atmospheric data sourced from GA-CSIRO atmospheirc baseline greenhouse gas station

Metadata constraints

Title

Australian Government Security ClassificationSystem

Edition date
2018-11-01T00:00:00
Website

https://www.protectivesecurity.gov.au/Pages/default.aspx

Classification
Unclassified

Metadata

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urn:uuid/ec45e54a-eefb-2b71-e044-00144fdd4fa6

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GeoNetwork UUID

Language
English
Character encoding
UTF8
Contact
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Point of contact

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

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Resource scope
Non geographic dataset
Name

nonGeographicDataset

Alternative metadata reference

Title

Geoscience Australia - short identifier for metadata record with

uuid

Citation identifier
eCatId/78546

Metadata linkage

https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/ec45e54a-eefb-2b71-e044-00144fdd4fa6

Date info (Revision)
2018-04-20T06:04:18
Date info (Creation)
2013-11-29T00:00:00

Metadata standard

Title

AU/NZS ISO 19115-1:2014

Metadata standard

Title

ISO 19115-1:2014

Metadata standard

Title

ISO 19115-3

Title

Geoscience Australia Community Metadata Profile of ISO 19115-1:2014

Edition

Version 2.0, September 2018

Citation identifier
https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/122551

 
 

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W


Keywords

atmosphere climate greenhouse gas emissions

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