The Oil and Gas Sector Is Leaking Methane. Here’s How to Track It.

The Oil Climate Index plus Gas (OCI+), an open-source interactive tool, offers powerful insights on the wide-ranging methane intensity of the world’s oil and gas resources.

The oil and gas sector continues to be a leaky business. Wasteful industry operations account for nearly 80 million metric tons of methane leaked in 2023, squandering precious resources and flying in the face of economic logic. This energy waste also superheats the planet: methane, the main component of gas, is a powerful climate pollutant, warming the Earth over 80 times more potently than carbon dioxide. All told, preventing gas from escaping benefits the economy, security, and health.
 
RMI’s cutting-edge interactive web tool — the Oil Climate Index plus Gas (OCI+) — reveals the size, scope, and nature of the opportunity to prevent losing valuable gas and leaking methane. As shown below, our most recent assessment estimates that methane emitted by the oil and gas sector is responsible, on average, for over one-half of this industry’s emissions, rivaling CO₂.
 
Depending on how oil and gas is extracted, processed, and transported, differences in methane emissions intensities from one asset to another can vary by several orders of magnitude. Flaring unwanted gas and venting gas from equipment are the largest sources of oil and gas methane pollution. Both are preventable. 

The OCI+ interactive tool transparently assesses the emissions intensity from 70 percent of the world’s oil and gas supplies, offering asset-level intelligence needed to identify opportunities to safely manage methane. The OCI+ data is being used by financial institutions, insurers, oil and gas operators, commercial gas buyers, policy makers, academics, and civil society to prioritize actions that keep gas in the pipe and out of the air.  

Key OCI+ Insights   

1. The oil and gas sector offers the top priority opportunity to cut methane emissions and energy waste. The International Energy Agency reports in its Global Methane Tracker that oil and gas methane emissions can be reduced by around 75 percent through well-known measures, including implementing leak detection and repair procedures and upgrading high-emitting equipment. Fixes already exist to increase systemwide efficiency that can prevent gas loss and help bolster economic security amid market uncertainty.

2. Openly and verifiably certifying natural gas supplies — both from upstream production and midstream transport and storage — by their methane leakage rates using protocols like the MiQ Standard are creating new markets and a competitive advantage for low-leakage oil and gas. Currently, MiQ has certified one in every four cubic feet of US gas and even more globally.

3. Satellites and remote sensing measurements are making methane visible. The concentration of methane in the atmosphere is at the highest level since measurements began. Understanding where these emissions are coming from is a critical step to mitigating them. The good news is that a growing array of data portals, hosted by entities including Carbon Mapper, MethaneSAT, and Kayrros Methane Watch, are routinely and openly mapping oil and gas (and other) methane super-emitters and area emissions. The OCI+ is incorporating remotely-sensed methane emissions into our emissions intensity results.

Prioritizing action  

Oil and gas operations generate emissions across their lengthy supply chains. Methane leakage can occur intentionally to dispose of unwanted gas or from outdated and poorly maintained equipment, such as tanks that routinely vent gas. Lax maintenance and inadequate operations, such as gas sent to inefficient flares, vent large volumes of methane and associated gases. Unintentional leaks also result from equipment failures, such as a broken seal or valve. And gas can be squandered for reasons beyond operators’ control, such as damage to assets from superstorms and war. Regardless, there’s no excuse for allowing gas to leak unchecked when solutions exist to spot and stop it. 

Strategically managing methane requires targeted climate action. Given wide-ranging climate intensities of otherwise equivalent barrels of oil and gas identified by the OCI+, the most impactful solutions rest on identifying the highest-emitting assets with the greatest production, shaded orange in the plot below. In addition, assets with above average methane intensities but low production volumes and below-average methane intensities with high production volumes (blue shaded boxes) present the next level of methane mitigation opportunities. Those assets with low intensities that are produced in low volumes (shaded green) offer the least mitigation potential. A majority of assets modeled provide meaningful methane reduction opportunities.   

Mitigating methane meets multiple goals  

Solutions to stop gas from leaking can create jobs, protect public safety, and bolster national security. Methane is co-emitted with carcinogens and air toxins, so stopping it benefits human health. Methane also reacts to form smog that pollutes the air. And when gas releases are large enough, fires and explosions can result. Consequently, leak-free systems pose far less danger to people and property.   

The oil and gas sector is responsible for an estimated one-third of global methane emissions, representing our most significant near-term opportunity to keep gas in the pipe and slow global temperature rise. Given that methane superheats the planet, carefully containing gas means less damage and disruption from extreme weather events. Considering these opportunities together makes it clear that slashing methane is the key to protecting our prosperity, safety, and environment.  

Companies, countries, and communities are banding together to stop gas from leaking, creating a winning trifecta for energy, environmental, and economic security. Every molecule of methane that stays in a leak-free system improves efficiency and can help deliver more energy for consumers, cutting waste as energy needs grow. The past five years have heralded many methane pollution firsts — from global pledges signed by a majority of nations to reduce methane by 30 percent by 2030 to commitments made by over fifty companies in 30 nations to end routine flaring and deliver net-zero upstream methane emissions by 2030. Doubling down on these methane pronouncements and making them real is crucial to our secure energy future.  

This article was informed by the contributions of Sasha Bylsma, Shannon Hughes, Colm Quinn, Amanda Sessler, and RMI’s entire Oil and Gas Solutions Initiative team. It would not have been possible without the generous support of Bloomberg Philanthropies.