Articles | Volume 22, issue 7
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-4303-2022
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-4303-2022
Research article
 | 
04 Apr 2022
Research article |  | 04 Apr 2022

Quantification and assessment of methane emissions from offshore oil and gas facilities on the Norwegian continental shelf

Amy Foulds, Grant Allen, Jacob T. Shaw, Prudence Bateson, Patrick A. Barker, Langwen Huang, Joseph R. Pitt, James D. Lee, Shona E. Wilde, Pamela Dominutti, Ruth M. Purvis, David Lowry, James L. France, Rebecca E. Fisher, Alina Fiehn, Magdalena Pühl, Stéphane J. B. Bauguitte, Stephen A. Conley, Mackenzie L. Smith, Tom Lachlan-Cope, Ignacio Pisso, and Stefan Schwietzke

Related authors

Aircraft-based mass balance estimate of methane emissions from offshore gas facilities in the southern North Sea
Magdalena Pühl, Anke Roiger, Alina Fiehn, Alan M. Gorchov Negron, Eric A. Kort, Stefan Schwietzke, Ignacio Pisso, Amy Foulds, James Lee, James L. France, Anna E. Jones, Dave Lowry, Rebecca E. Fisher, Langwen Huang, Jacob Shaw, Prudence Bateson, Stephen Andrews, Stuart Young, Pamela Dominutti, Tom Lachlan-Cope, Alexandra Weiss, and Grant Allen
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 24, 1005–1024, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-1005-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-1005-2024, 2024
Short summary
Flaring efficiencies and NOx emission ratios measured for offshore oil and gas facilities in the North Sea
Jacob T. Shaw, Amy Foulds, Shona Wilde, Patrick Barker, Freya A. Squires, James Lee, Ruth Purvis, Ralph Burton, Ioana Colfescu, Stephen Mobbs, Samuel Cliff, Stéphane J.-B. Bauguitte, Stuart Young, Stefan Schwietzke, and Grant Allen
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 23, 1491–1509, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-1491-2023,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-1491-2023, 2023
Short summary
Quantifying fossil fuel methane emissions using observations of atmospheric ethane and an uncertain emission ratio
Alice E. Ramsden, Anita L. Ganesan, Luke M. Western, Matthew Rigby, Alistair J. Manning, Amy Foulds, James L. France, Patrick Barker, Peter Levy, Daniel Say, Adam Wisher, Tim Arnold, Chris Rennick, Kieran M. Stanley, Dickon Young, and Simon O'Doherty
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 3911–3929, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-3911-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-3911-2022, 2022
Short summary

Related subject area

Subject: Gases | Research Activity: Field Measurements | Altitude Range: Troposphere | Science Focus: Chemistry (chemical composition and reactions)
The impact of organic nitrates on summer ozone formation in Shanghai, China
Chunmeng Li, Xiaorui Chen, Haichao Wang, Tianyu Zhai, Xuefei Ma, Xinping Yang, Shiyi Chen, Min Zhou, Shengrong Lou, Xin Li, Limin Zeng, and Keding Lu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 3905–3918, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3905-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3905-2025, 2025
Short summary
Differences in the key volatile organic compound species between their emitted and ambient concentrations in ozone formation
Xudong Zheng and Shaodong Xie
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 3807–3820, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3807-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3807-2025, 2025
Short summary
Mechanistic insights into chloroacetic acid production from atmospheric multiphase volatile organic compound–chlorine chemistry
Mingxue Li, Men Xia, Chunshui Lin, Yifan Jiang, Weihang Sun, Yurun Wang, Yingnan Zhang, Maoxia He, and Tao Wang
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 3753–3764, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3753-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3753-2025, 2025
Short summary
Accurate elucidation of oxidation under heavy ozone pollution: a full suite of radical measurements in the chemically complex atmosphere
Renzhi Hu, Guoxian Zhang, Haotian Cai, Jingyi Guo, Keding Lu, Xin Li, Shengrong Lou, Zhaofeng Tan, Changjin Hu, Pinhua Xie, and Wenqing Liu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 3011–3028, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3011-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3011-2025, 2025
Short summary
Emissions of intermediate-volatility and semi-volatile organic compounds (I/SVOCs) from different cumulative-mileage diesel vehicles at various ambient temperatures
Shuwen Guo, Xuan Zheng, Xiao He, Lewei Zeng, Liqiang He, Xian Wu, Yifei Dai, Zihao Huang, Ting Chen, Shupei Xiao, Yan You, Sheng Xiang, Shaojun Zhang, Jingkun Jiang, and Ye Wu
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 2695–2705, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-2695-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-2695-2025, 2025
Short summary

Cited articles

Allen, G., Hollingsworth, P., Kabbabe, K., Pitt, J. R., Mead, M. I., Illingworth, S., Roberts, G., Bourn, M., Shallcross, D. E., and Percival, C. J.: The development and trial of an unmanned aerial system for the measurement of methane flux from landfill and greenhouse gas emission hotspots, Waste Manage., 87, 883–892, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2017.12.024, 2019. 
Brown, E. N., Friehe, C. A., and Lenschow, D. H.: The Use of Pressure Fluctuations on the Nose of an Aircraft for Measuring Air Motion, J. Clim. Appl. Meteorol., 22, 171–180, https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0450(1983)022<0171:TUOPFO>2.0.CO;2, 1983. 
Cambaliza, M. O. L., Shepson, P. B., Caulton, D. R., Stirm, B., Samarov, D., Gurney, K. R., Turnbull, J., Davis, K. J., Possolo, A., Karion, A., Sweeney, C., Moser, B., Hendricks, A., Lauvaux, T., Mays, K., Whetstone, J., Huang, J., Razlivanov, I., Miles, N. L., and Richardson, S. J.: Assessment of uncertainties of an aircraft-based mass balance approach for quantifying urban greenhouse gas emissions, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 14, 9029–9050, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-14-9029-2014, 2014. 
Carbon Limits: Overview of methane detection and measurement technologies for offshore applications: https://www.carbonlimits.no/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Methane-measurement-technologies-offshore_for-website.pdf (last access: 4 August 2021), 2020. 
Conley, S., Franco, G., Faloona, I., Blake, D. R., Peischl, J., and Ryerson, T. B.: Methane emissions from the 2015 Aliso Canyon blowout in Los Angeles, CA, Science, 351, 1317–1320, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aaf2348, 2016. 
Download
Short summary
We measured CH4 emissions from 21 offshore oil and gas facilities in the Norwegian Sea in 2019. Measurements compared well with operator-reported emissions but were greatly underestimated when compared with a 2016 global fossil fuel inventory. This study demonstrates the need for up-to-date and accurate inventories for use in research and policy and the important benefits of best-practice reporting methods by operators. Airborne measurements are an effective tool to validate such inventories.
Share
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint