The rate at which new reports on shale gas operations are coming out, argues strongly for the importance of the NB Commission on Hydraulic Fracturing.
For example, the Fraser Institute released a Research Bulletin in October that reviews some of the risk assessment literature on hydraulic fracturing and shale gas extraction. It is titled Managing the Risks of Hydraulic Fracturing: A Update (PDF). The Telegraph Journal has reported extensively on this document.
At about the same time Robert Howarth of Cornell University Department of Ecology and Environmental Biology published a report titled, “Methane Emissions and Climatic Warming Risk from Hydraulic Fracturing and Shale Gas Development: Implications for Policy.”
The Commission will no doubt study both documents before releasing its report to government in March 2016.
There seem to be widespread agreement that the best scientific information should help guide decisions on shale gas. The Howarth report, for example, documents a new level of accuracy in measuring methane leakage from shale gas operations. The Fraser Institute Bulletin does not reference this advance in research measurement, nor does it include methane leakage in its list of five risk factors, although it is briefly mentioned in the section on air pollution.
The Howarth report documents how new and more accurate measuring techniques indicate methane leakage from shale gas operations is much larger than previously assessed. This is important information for understanding the climate warming risk of shale gas development and the control of greenhouse gas emissions overall.
The difference between the Fraser Bulletin and the Howarth report on methane leakage is instructive. The former gives a general 3% leakage figure that dates from earlier research and then assumes that “… the risk can largely be solved by existing, cost-effective technologies.”
The Howarth report, however, documents current leakage in various geographic zones of shale gas development and explains the impact of these emissions on the risk of increasing climate change. In major shale gas test areas, new measurements show methane leakage from 9.5% to 12 % at the drilling and extraction sites.
There is general agreement that it is normal for another 2.5% leakage to occur “downstream” during storage and delivery to customers. Howarth concludes that methane leakage from shale gas operations is a critical factor in the human contribution to climate change.
Although climate change risk is a global condition, it is also directly relevant to NB. The NB government is committed to a Climate Action Plan that reduces greenhouse gas emissions. Under current industry conditions, expanding shale gas extraction in NB will increase the province’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions.
We might ask, can’t industry stop the methane leakage? Apparently not or they would have done so since methane is their product and leakage means loss of revenue and profit.
Currently, NB has around 50 active and inactive natural gas wells. According to current projections, at least 2000 wells would be initially required to exploit NB’s shale gas potential; beyond that, additional wells would have to be continually drilled and fracked to compensate for the normally rapid depletion of new shale gas wells. The more wells, the greater the leakage. Abandoned drilling sites often continue to leak methane.
Methane is 100 times more effective at trapping solar heat than carbon dioxide, but it dissipates in the atmosphere within just twelve years. This means that cutting down and preventing methane emissions will have a rapid effect in helping to hold down global warming.
Climate action policies generally focus on reducing carbon dioxide because our economy produces so much of it. But CO2 remains in the atmosphere for hundreds of years so mitigation will be a long slow process. Action on CO2 reduction is important but, according to Howarth, stopping the increase in methane emissions by foregoing shale gas development addresses climate change mitigation in an even more critical way.
Keith Helmuth is a member of the Woodstock Sustainable Energy Group.