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Fugitive Methane Emission Identification And Source Attribution: Ethane-To-Methane Analysis Using A Portable Cavity Ring-down Spectroscopy Analyzer

Literature Reference
Poster
Authors

David Kim-Hak, Derek Fleck, John Yiu, Zhiwei Lin and Gregor Lucic

Presented at

EGU - AGU 2017

Abstract

Natural gas analysis and methane specifically have become increasingly important by virtue of methane’s 28-36x greenhouse warming potential compared to CO2 and accounting for 10% of total greenhouse gas emissions in the US alone. Determining the specific fingerprint of methane sources by quantifying the ethane to methane (C2:C1) ratios provides us with means to understand processes yielding methane and allows for sources of methane to be mapped and classified through these processes; i.e. biogenic or thermogenic, oil vs. gas vs. coal gas-related. In the US, natural gas has a C2:C1 ranging from 2-5%.