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Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

nature.com

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Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#41

Post by masteranza »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #37
masteranza wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also much more on methane in particular: https://motls.blogspot.com/search?q=methane

Scott Aaronson's response to Lubos Motl's skepticism is informative: "My position is an incredibly simple one: just like with the link between smoking and cancer, or the lack of a link between vaccines and autism, or any other issue where I lack the expertise to evaluate the evidence myself, I’ll go with what certainly looks like an overwhelming consensus among the scientists who’ve studied the matter carefully. Peri…

Except, that most scientists (physicists that I know) who independently checked the issue seem to agree with Lubos.

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#42

Post by wollstonecraft »

Alex3917 wrote: post #30

Here is a TED talk my dad just gave about a satellite they're building to track down the source of these methane leaks and fix the issue: https://www.ted.com/talks/fred_krupp_what_if_we_tracked_meth...

What is the detection limit?

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#43

Post by phragomax »

sremani wrote: post #39
daxorid wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fracking and horizontal drilling are the only things that have kept us out of a global energy crisis. Without their application to tight oil and gas fields, the world would be firmly on the downslope of the global Hubbert peak right now. Ban it at your peril.

I really feel really bad you are getting down voted. There is lack of understanding of how shale revolution reshaped America and its energy independence here in this forum.

What has energy independence actually done for America? We are still fighting wars in the Middle East.

For decades people were saying we need to end reliance on foreign oil. Well, we've ended it. What has that gotten us besides underpriced gasoline?

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#44

Post by wcoenen »

mrfusion wrote: post #38
jacquesm wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a five year period Methane traps ~100 times more energy than the equivalent quantity of CO2, so not burning Methane because it escapes is far worse than burning it! http://www.onegreenplanet.org/animalsandnature/methane-vs-ca...

But it also doesn’t hang around for that long. Maybe better in the long term to release it than burn it?

For most of the ways methane breaks down, it gets converted to CO2 anyway[1]. So it's better to break it down to CO2 immediately to avoid the stronger greenhouse effect of methane.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_methane#Natural_si...

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#45

Post by natch »

daxorid wrote: post #31
pjc50 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fracking ban.

Fracking and horizontal drilling are the only things that have kept us out of a global energy crisis. Without their application to tight oil and gas fields, the world would be firmly on the downslope of the global Hubbert peak right now. Ban it at your peril.

If we had invested the Iraq war money into solar infrastructure including batteries in the grid, we would be ahead of the game and peak oil would be moot.

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#46

Post by tomatotomato37 »

avip wrote: post #14

To anyone reading "“tremendous opportunity” to reduce methane emissions by developing systems to quickly detect malfunctions at oil and gas facilities" and running to the garage to connect an RPI to an off-the-shelf 5$ sensor and submit her YC2019 application: The tech is there. It's been there for years. Everything is in place, this is a political/emission tax/EPA/incentive issue per-se.

So are a lot of other startup opportunities, but that just means you don't mention it during the presentations for your funding rounds

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#47

Post by lern_too_spel »

masteranza wrote: post #41
lern_too_spel wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scott Aaronson's response to Lubos Motl's skepticism is informative: "My position is an incredibly simple one: just like with the link between smoking and cancer, or the lack of a link between vaccines and autism, or any other issue where I lack the expertise to evaluate the evidence myself, I’ll go with what certainly looks like an overwhelming consensus among the scientists who’ve studied the matter carefully. Peri…

Except, that most scientists (physicists that I know) who independently checked the issue seem to agree with Lubos.

All scientists that I know (including the physicists) disagree with Lubos. This includes former skeptic, Richard Muller. As Aaronson suggests, the physicists that you know should publish their papers.

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#48

Post by tajen »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #36
sgc wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Methane tax.

Methane contains just as much carbon as carbon dioxide does. (By volume; by weight it would be a lot more.)

...but is 84x more potent as a greenhouse gas as if we burn it.

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#49

Post by driverdan »

tejtm wrote: post #33

Satellite image of burning gas as a "waste product" from five years ago. Note there are no large cities of people there. http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/01/28/article-2269517-17...

I downvoted you for linking to something from the Daily Mail rag. Nothing they publish is reliable or trustworthy.

Re: Methane leaks from US gas fields dwarf government estimates

#50

Post by tejtm »

driverdan wrote: post #49
tejtm wrote: post #33

Satellite image of burning gas as a "waste product" from five years ago. Note there are no large cities of people there. http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/01/28/article-2269517-17...

I downvoted you for linking to something from the Daily Mail rag. Nothing they publish is reliable or trustworthy.

Sorry mate, first image link in a DDG search nothing profound, Not even familiar with who they are, granted I was pretty sure they they did not take the snap. I will try to be mote discerning next time (the thought had crossed my mind to figure out whence it came)
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