Airborne Trace Gas and Aerosol Measurements in Several Shale Gas Basins during the SONGNEX (Shale Oil and Natural Gas Nexus) Campaign 2015

Abstract:

Oil and natural gas from tight sand and shale formations has increased strongly over the last decade. This increased production has been associated with emissions of methane, non-methane hydrocarbons and other trace gases to the atmosphere, which are concerns for air quality, climate and air toxics.

The NOAA Shale Oil and Natural Gas Nexus (SONGNEX) aircraft campaign took place in 2015, when the NOAA WP-3 aircraft conducted 20 research flights between March 19 and April 27, 2015 in the following shale gas regions: Denver-Julesberg, Uintah, Upper Green River, San Juan, Bakken, Barnett, Eagle Ford, Haynesville, Woodford, and Permian. The NOAA P3 was equipped with an extensive set of gas phase measurements, including instruments for methane, ethane, CO, CO₂, a new H3O+CIMS, canister and cartridge samples for VOCs, HCHO, glyoxal, HNO₃, NH₃, NO_x, NOy, PANs, ozone, and SO₂. Aerosol number and size distributions were also measured.

This presentation will focus on an overview of all the measurements onboard the NOAA WP-3 aircraft and discuss the differences between the shale gas regions. Due to a drop in oil prices, drilling for oil decreased in the months prior to the mission, but nevertheless the production of oil and natural gas were near the all-time high. Many of the shale gas basins investigated during SONGNEX have quite different characteristics. For example, the Permian Basin is a well-established field, whereas the Eagle Ford and the Bakken saw an almost exponential increase in production over the last few years. The basins differ by the relative amounts of natural gas versus oil that is being produced. Previous work had shown a large variability in methane emissions relative to the production (leak rate) between different basins. By including more and qualitatively different basins during SONGNEX, the study has provided an extensive data set to address how emissions depend on raw gas composition, extraction techniques and regulation. The influence of these differences on the emission will be investigated by looking at average mixing ratios of all the measured trace species. Finally, other emissions sources that were measured during SONGNEX such as the crude oil storage in Cushing, OK, coal mining, biogenics, and biomass burning from small agricultural fires and long range transport from Russia will be briefly discussed.