Lawmakers demand oil, gas firms divulge methane leak data

WASHINGTON — The House Science Committee has notified the chief executives of 10 major oil companies that they must disclose more data about their emissions of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, in one of America’s biggest oil and gas producing regions.

The lawmakers wrote late Thursday that the companies’ current approach to monitoring methane emissions in the Permian Basin is inadequate and they must to do more to curb a pollutant that more than 100 other countries have pledged to cut by 30 percent by the end of the decade.

The commitment, launched by the United States and the European Union, marked one of the highlights of last month’s U.N. climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland.

“The United States cannot achieve its targeted reduction in methane emissions under the Global Methane Pledge without a swift and large-scale decline in oil and gas sector methane leaks,” Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Texas, chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, wrote in a letter to the chief executives. “The existence of these leaks, as well as continued uncertainty regarding their size, duration, and frequency, threatens America’s ability to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.”

Johnson wrote to most of the biggest fossil fuel producers in the Permian Basin, which extends from West Texas to southeastern New Mexico. They included ExxonMobil, Occidental Petroleum, ConocoPhillips, Chevron and Pioneer Natural Resources, as well as lesser-known companies including Ameredev II LLC, Coterra, Devon Energy, Admiral Permian Resources and Mewbourne Oil.

ExxonMobil spokesman Casey Norton said the company’s plans align with the global methane goal.

It plans to cut its own methane emissions 40 percent to 50 percent by 2026 compared with a decade earlier, while “developing, testing and deploying new methane detection and mitigation technologies.”

Pioneer Natural Resources Vice President Tadd Owens said that the company shares Johnson’s “interest in better understanding and minimizing methane emissions from the Permian Basin” and was “proud of the progress” it has made in methane and flaring reduction. He said it would take some time to provide a detailed reply to Johnson’s letter.

Methane, the main component of natural gas, is the world’s second-largest contributor to climate change behind carbon dioxide. Although it dissipates more quickly, it is more than 80 times more powerful than carbon dioxide for the first 20 years after it is first released into the atmosphere.

Clamping down on methane could help world leaders meet their target of containing planetary warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, above levels at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.

Eliminating methane leaks from existing oil and gas operations represents one of the easiest ways to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, in part because companies often profit by capturing natural gas that would otherwise escape.

This fall, the International Energy Agency estimated that “more than 70 percent of current emissions from oil and gas operations are technically feasible to prevent” and around 45 percent could be plugged at no net cost.

IEA said it would be even more profitable to do so now, given the turmoil in European energy markets and record high natural gas prices. In some places, capturing methane would mean building new pipelines, processing centers and storage.

But estimating the cost of those investments requires accurate information.

Johnson said she was “concerned” that leak detection and repair programs at the companies “may not be designed and equipped to comprehensively monitor and detect methane leaks, particularly the intermittent, ‘super-emitting’ leaks that are responsible for much of the sector’s leak emissions.”

The congressional request demands that the companies disclose information about their own intermittent, large emission leaks, and how they found them. It also asked operators how their methods for calculating emissions differed from those required by the Environmental Protection Agency’s greenhouse gas reporting program.

Recent advances in satellites, sensors, drones and computers capable of speedier data sifting have made it difficult for methane emitters to conceal their leaks.

The House Science Committee said “innovative” detection techniques include aerial surveys, drone-based surveys and ground-based monitoring sensors.

The panel is looking into whether federal agencies monitoring greenhouse gases are collecting accurate information.