Possible malfunction in widely used methane sampler deserves attention but poses limited implications for supply chain emission estimates

• Main Authors: Ramón A. Alvarez, David R. Lyon, Anthony J. Marchese, Allen L. Robinson, Steven P. Hamburg
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: BioOne 2016-12-01
• Series: Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene
• Subjects: methane; natural gas production
• Online Access: http://elementascience.org/article/info:doi/10.12952/journal.elementa.000137

Abstract Estimates of methane emissions from natural gas production sites in the United States based on recent studies have been questioned due to possible malfunction of the Bacharach Hi Flow® Sampler (BHFS), the primary measurement instrument used for two out of five source types examined in those studies (equipment leaks and chemical injection pumps). Without assessing whether the BHFS malfunction occurred in those studies, we constrain the possible underestimation of emissions associated with the BHFS-based results by excluding potentially affected measurements. Assuming leak emission rates are similar for sites with low and high methane content, U.S. methane emissions from equipment leaks and chemical injection pumps in recent studies could be underestimated by up to 40–80% due to a malfunctioning BHFS. We discuss uncertainties associated with this estimate. While a 40–80% underestimation is important when characterizing individual source categories, the potential implications are attenuated when aggregating emissions across the five sources examined in the recent studies (<12–24%), across all sources in the natural gas production segment (<7–14%), or across the entire supply chain (<2–5%). Therefore, potential errors caused by BHFS malfunction in recent studies would not substantially alter estimates of methane emissions from the U.S. natural gas supply chain. The possible malfunction of such a widely-used instrument deserves further attention to ensure that its use in quantifying emissions from individual supply chain components is not compromised.