Increasing our understanding of methane emissions

GTI has participated in a robust set of studies focused on increasing our understanding of methane emissions from natural gas distribution and end use.

One on-going effort currently focuses on the methods and processes needed to properly develop company-specific emission factors for particular components within their own systems. The development of such procedures will allow companies to evaluate the ways that regulatory bodies currently calculate emissions for their companies, and ensure that the most complete up-to-date and realistic numbers are used in reporting and calculations of emission inventories.

GTI is also actively exploring methane emissions from areas “beyond the meter.” For instance, GTI is participating in a project led by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) with funding provided by the California Energy Commission. The study is focused on taking a multi-tiered measurement approach to explore emissions from two natural gas fired power plants and one industrial facility with a natural gas boiler system. Additionally, the study included detailed quantification of methane emissions from compressed natural gas vehicle fueling stations. The report is expected to be released in 2021.

The U.S. EPA has also become very interested in how to include a more granular representation of methane emissions “beyond the meter” in the Annual Greenhouse Gas Inventory based on recommendations from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Several studies are examining end use methane emissions from residential, commercial, and industrial facilities. A GTI effort funded by OTD and CARB is measuring emissions from residential customer meters, and a project involving GTI, UTD, LBNL, and Stanford is measuring emissions from residential appliances. In California, CEC is funding GTI’s efforts to measure emissions from commercial buildings, such as food services. UTD is providing financial support as GTI works to measure and mitigate emissions from residential, commercial, and industrial applications as well as natural gas vehicles.