Reducing oil ‘flaring’ could cut emissions in a big way

The burning of unwanted gas associated with oil production—called “flaring”—remains the most carbon-intensive part of producing oil, according to a new analysis.

Until renewable sources of energy like wind or solar become more reliable and less expensive, people worldwide remain reliant on fossil fuels for transportation and energy. This means that if people want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, there need to be better ways of mitigating the effects of extracting and burning oil and gas.

Adam Brandt, assistant professor of energy resources engineering in the School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences at Stanford University, and his colleagues have performed a first global analysis comparing emissions associated with oil production techniques—a step toward developing policies that could reduce those emissions.

The group reports that in 2015, nearly 9,000 oilfields in 90 countries produced greenhouse gases equivalent to 1.7 gigatons of carbon dioxide—roughly 5 percent of all emissions from fuel combustion that year. On average, oil production emitted 10.3 grams of emissions for every megajoule of crude. Nations with the most carbon-intensive practices cranked out emissions at nearly twice that rate.

Further, the study suggests that eliminating routine flaring and cutting methane leaks and venting to rates already achieved in Norway could cut as much as 700 megatons of emissions from the oil sector’s annual carbon footprint—a reduction of roughly 43 percent.

Here, Brandt discusses the group’s findings and strategies for reducing flaring.

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