BCGS Technical Talk – October 2021
Speaker: David Wares, Sales Director (Western Canada), GHGSat
Title: Monitoring GHG Emissions
Date: Thursday, November 18, 2021
Time: 4:00pm – 5:00pm PST
Location: Webinar via Zoom (distributed via our newsletter)
Bio:
David Wares graduated from Queen’s University with a degree in Chemical Engineering. He has been in the energy industry for 16 years with time at Shell (in their Green House Gas Department), Weatherford, Pason and most recently joined GHGSat to help utilize emission sensing technology and data technology for industries seeking to decarbonize their activities and the planet we all share.
Description:
The geophysical profession will be increasingly involved in climate solutions (earth science for CO2 sequestration, research into natural and anthropogenic GHG sources and sinks, GHG monitoring including remote sensing, airborne and satellite etc.). David’s talk will be particularly interesting to students examining career paths as GHGSat represents a Canadian company in a rapidly growing sector that will employ the geophysical skill set. Geophysicists from large multi sector resource companies are being asked to provide inhouse expertise and opinions on GHG monitoring options as more requirements begin to be implemented by regulators.
GHGSat’s new Pulse online map shows the effects of the earth’s seasonal and latitudinal variations in methane concentration (all rolled up with local methane emissions). GHGSat also provides airborne and satellite methane monitoring and analytical services that allow assessment of fugitive emissions from individual sites.
Abstract:
Monitoring methane emissions from oil and gas facilities requires the combination of several technologies to gain a full understanding of the challenge at a manageable cost. The integration of frequent and affordable high resolution satellite measurements to find the larger leaks with less frequent aircraft surveys, forms the basis of a tiered monitoring system showing great promise to optimize Leak Detection and Repair (LDAR) activities. In this presentation, we will present examples of methane emissions measurements at oil and gas facilities acquired with both GHGSat’s satellites, and the airborne variant with the imaging spectrometer design. While the combination of different technologies is not uncommon, this system is the first in the world utilizing the same sensor concept at two different altitudes. The performance parameters of each system will be highlighted and supported with recent examples. In addition, the advantages of the hybrid system will be discussed, including the opportunity for cross-validation of measurements. Also, we will discuss other methane detecting satellites currently in orbit or scheduled for launch. Finally, the potential of such a system to be used for regulatory reporting purposes will be discussed and contrasted to the standard of performing Optical Gas Imaging (OGI) camera campaigns three times a year used in jurisdictions, such as in Canada and the US.
Webinar:
A recording of this webinar will be made available after the talk on our Youtube channel.