Hidden Menace: Massive methane leaks speed up climate change
News Article: https://apnews.com/article/science-texas-trending-news-climate-and-environment-0eb6880f7c4532a845155a3bd44c2e4b
Scientific Article: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acs.estlett.1c00173
September 11th, 2023
Ellen Gross
The main issue discussed in these articles is the many large methane leaks throughout the Permian Basin: an area of West Texas central to oil-and-gas production in the United States. As nearly 40 percent of the United States oil-and-gas production stems from this area, the companies in control of production sites there benefit extremely from continued production, despite new studies demonstrating the methane pollution these sites are leaking into the atmosphere. Major news sources like AP News have begun to publish articles discussing this issue like the one I will evaluate here, “Hidden Menace: Massive methane leaks speed up climate change” published in July of 2022. The article cites a study published in ACS Publications, “Intermittency of Large Methane Emitters in the Permian Basin” in 2021.
The research study works to tie up holes they found in the literature and determine the uncertainty in persistence of emitted methane in the Permian Basin. The ability to differentiate between intermittent sources, readily predictable due to maintenance, and persistent sources, constant leaking due to malfunctioning, is very helpful in mitigation aid. The study used airborne spectrophotometers from September to November of 2019 to categorize production sites producing methane leaks. The study used a three trial minimum for their data. Their results show 1100 distinct super-emitting sites, each with more than one methane plume being categorized as one site due to a predetermined close proximity. Production sites were found to have the fastest leakage rates when compared with pipelines, well-sites, and other potential-leakage sources (Fig. 1). They also compared the emission rate (kg/hr) in the Permian Basin overall to other areas where similar studies were done within the same year (Fig. 1). Unsurprisingly, the Permian plumes were found to be releasing significantly more methane at a faster rate than in other places.
Figure 1. Distribution of CH4 emissions throughout the study compared to the distribution during two prior campaigns: the California Methane Survey (Duren et al., 2019) in panels A and B, and the Four Corners survey (Frankenberg et al., 2016) in panel A.
The news article uses the information from the scientific paper to discuss the super-emitter issues within the Permian basin and the lack of regulations placed there. They begin by making the data from the scientific study easily accessible to the public by comparing the amounts of methane gas released at one production station to how many tanker trucks full of gasoline per day it equates to, turning out to be seven tanker trucks of gas per station per day. They discuss the difference between intermittent and persistent sources of leakage and detail the harmful effects of methane including explaining methane’s role in climate change: increasing extreme weather effects and long lasting changes.
After the scientific discussion the news article takes a turn to the discussion of the politics behind these methane super emitters and the lack of regulations. They make the point that as of right now, the EPA and congress have no nationwide regulations on invisible gas, which leaves all regulation up to company discretion. In Texas however, these regulations that are left to companies alone never get implemented in practice. After interviewing with multiple company leaders, the reporters conclude that they talk about “working on it”, but there is zero specifics or evidence of procedure. They then work towards this claim that the politics of Texas are a major influence on this lack of regulation as the Permian Basin is dominated by republican politics. At the time the article was written, the Trump administration was in office and removing all of the previous pushes for climate policy. This connection with the republican majority in the Permian Basin is what the news article claims is the reason for greater plumes in the area: the fact that the politics of the area support disregarding these leaks and the climate change impacts in general.
Overall, the article does a good job of making the scientific information from the literature accessible to the public audience by explaining each step of the thought process that connects the study’s data and its climate effect. Each step, from explaining the significance of methane pollution to the importance of leakage type, is broken down into smaller parts and discussed sequentially, making the information easy to follow even without a scientific background. For their solid explanation of the science behind the research, I give this article a 7.5/10, but of course that is not without shortcomings. In terms of the presentation of the scientific data, all of the data was well represented, but was done throughout the article instead of all at once. The break-up of data decreased the power of it to me; each time more data would appear if it felt less significant as I felt like the discussion had already moved on from the data itself to its source and effects. For me, the data would be more powerful and seem as truly staggering as it is if it was kept together and introduced at the start of the article. The other qualm I have is that the title does not exactly match the actual content of the article. To me, the title makes it sound like there should be more discussion of climate effects and the speed of climate change, with less discussion of politics. While both are important aspects of climate change to pay attention to, I feel that the article title should more clearly invoke what it will be discussing in order to not mislead readers searching for coverage on certain topics.
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I cannot get my comment replying to work so I am replying below! So sorry about the inconvenience!
@Esme Frattarelli
I also find it so interesting that a naturally made gas is so harmful to our planet's energy balance. It makes me wonder about how the balance had been staying in equilibrium up until now. Nonetheless, I would love to learn more about is the marketable-ness of methane. We know it is a natural gas that is easy to use as a power source but I do agree that knowing more about it in general could really help navigate climate change mitigation.
@Paul Schrotenboer
I do really appreciate their efforts of deconstructing the scientific text. In terms of the excess methane from fracking and all of the wasted methane, I believe that the article discusses that the companies just simply don't care that they are losing some of it. I understand (yet disagree) their disregard for the environmental impacts of wasted methane leaks, but economically I cannot understand why they would be okay with losing even just a bit of such a lucrative product.
@Kelsey Ramp
I completely see what you are saying about political information being more accessible to the public as it is more typical for general reading. Thanks for bringing that up because personally, as someone who isn't the biggest follower of politics, it was hard to see its significance in this specific article. I also find it interesting that you would rather see the scientific information presented spread out as is rather than all at once. Maybe it is due to my background/love of science but I do have a much easier dissecting data when presented all together. Now writing this and reading that back I am starting to see how that could be a difference of personal preference and definitely was just my opinion and how separating it could be seen as more beneficial to the public eye.
@Roland Ullrich
I completely agree. This article did put the information in a way that fairly represented the science and still was clear in the public eye. Looking back after digesting all of these comments I honestly think that I could have potentially ranked the article a bit higher. Maybe later in the semester after exposure to other (potentially worse) news articles I may have a different opinion.
@Marla Muter
That was one of my big takeaways as well. I was actually going to include that in my review but felt it took away from my other points and ended up not. I completely agree, for a news article to focus on science, even when directing politics, I wish it was a bit more objective. The description of the culture in Texas felt utterly unnecessary to me as well; I definitely felt like that point had already been made.
@Micheal Gosselin
I'm glad you felt this way too reading it; I thought maybe I was just tired but I did get lost in the wordiness of the article at points too. I know that article structure does significantly depend on personal preference, which is why I tried to avoid this in my discussion, but I very much agree that it felt a bit all over the place and broad.
@Cody Quiroz
I agree about the structure muddling the message. I wish the ideas were more compact and straightforward as I personally had a hard time keeping track as they jumped around between concepts. I think that was their attempt at creating a cohesive story but honestly just made me more confused! Nonetheless, a fairly solid article on complex science but easy for public digestion.
The article gives a good outline of the problem but I agree with you that the title is a bit misleading. I was expecting more information about how exactly methane impacts climate change- the article uses many data that are a bit hard to conceptualize, in my opinion. One thing I found really interesting in the AP article was the paragraph about wasting a marketable product. I've mainly heard about methane as a pollutant and a waste product so I was surprised that it is also a profitable resource. This made me wonder if methane has any uses that are not hard on our ecosystem. For example, if it reacts to form any other products that are less harmful or even beneficial to the environment. It's strange to me that a gas that comes from the environment is so damaging to it in the long run.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the author that the article does a good job at deconstructing the much heavier scientific language and data of the scientific article in a format that is more accessible to people who have not studied these things. In addition, I also agree that the article's title does not accurately reflect the content of the article, as the bulk of the article is concerned with the political side of climate change even though someone reading the title would be unlikely to suspect that this is such a large focus of the paper. One question I have is about the portion of the article that talks about excess methane from fracking, and how it is burned off in massive quantities. I wonder why exactly so much extra methane is wasted, and am very curious if efforts have been taken to try and retain more of the methane we already drilling rather than expanding to drilling at more locations.
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ReplyDeleteI agree that the news article does a good job of explaining the scientific data from the research article in terms understood by the public. I do not agree that the data presented would be more impactful if it were all presented together at once. The news article does a good job of bringing up data from the scientific article to support whatever point the author was trying to make. I could also see why the news article author didn't go into depth on the effects of climate change, other than listing events it can cause such as catastrophic droughts and superstorms, because that science may get a little muddy for the public. Instead, the news article goes into the politics of why this area has no regulations on limiting methane emissions, which is more relatable as everyone is aware of the main beliefs between the two parties.
DeleteI agree that the author of the article successfully broke down complex topics from the paper that would allow people not scientifically involved to make reasonable decisions about the impact of these pollutants on their health. I found the way the scientific values were communicated very resourceful. The way the broke down the pollution to be similar to burning 7 tanker trucks of fuel per station per day allows the reader to conceptualize the numbers from the scientific paper. I also found it important that the article dove into the politics of the matter, especially when discussing the lack of policies on these specific pollutants in these regions. If anything, this was another powerful call to action in a way that is easily digestible. I believe that the article did a solid job putting the issues plainly and not misappropriating the paper.
ReplyDeleteI would also have to agree that the title of the article makes it seem that it will be focusing mostly on the scientists' findings, not the government and state's environmental regulations. While I do agree that this is important, I feel the article could do this more concisely.
ReplyDeleteIn addition, I feel the article got political at certain points, which I find unnecessary. For example, the author describes a scene at a Texas restaurant where they ask a Trump-supporting woman if she believes in climate change, to which she replies that she believes in God. While I suppose this is the author's way of showing that people working in the oil and gas industry are worried that regulations will negatively impact their jobs, I found it to take away focus on the main point about the methane leaks.
I also admire the way that the AP article breaks down a lot of points that would not be accessible for people who are not familiar with methane and its properties or the policies surrounding greenhouse gas controls. I do think that this article could use some improvement in terms of structure, I think that it could have been more effective to approach this article from the "policy" and "resulting data" standpoint; this is to say that the current structure makes either the data or the policy section feel like an afterthought; if this alteration was made, I could also see further distribution of data and cross-analysis of more papers and other policies or movements in this article. I also would have tried to obtain permission to use the figures from the paper in my article as the article can feel very "wordy" at times and I think some figures from the paper might help show why what is being said is important. I don't think the article made any claims that were broadly outside the scope of the paper, but I do wish that the article would've better incorporated the science and policy, or simply discussed the science doing both, in this case, lead to decreased efficacy in both areas.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your take on the article. The article conveys the complex science and topics in a digestible way for the reader. As someone else said, I enjoy the use of analogies in the paper. The structure could have been better to make the paper more effective and concise. It is a bit lengthy at points which makes the message a bit muddled. I appreciated the dive into the politics and regulations relating to the methane problem, although I wish it was more focused and concise to really hammer the point home.
ReplyDeleteI mostly agree with your input on this article. I like your reference to the fact that the article makes the scientific information from the paper relatively easy to follow for the general public, especially in the way it describes each step. I do think it could use some more visuals, but I understand that the visuals may not be easy to grasp by a general reader, especially when referring to the visuals in the scientific paper. The video is helpful, though. I agree with Kelsey in that the article does a fine job using data from the scientific paper to support their points, and that the more sporadic use of data is actually helpful. I wouldn't say it has a more positive effect than what you suggest - all the data presented together at the beginning - but I don't necessarily agree with your point that the author's decision to spread the data throughout the article makes it more difficult to grasp or understand. It could help to present the data together at the start of the article and then write the article as is, perhaps bulleting the important data at the beginning and re-mentioning it throughout the article when describing the points that each piece of data refers to. Nonetheless, the article does indeed do a decent job describing the consequential information explained throughout the scientific paper.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point that the article title is somewhat misleading, and I also would have preferred if the data from the study was in one section instead of spread throughout. However, I also did appreciate the inclusion of the politics involved in this issue. I think it appeals to the general public and helps explain why this is happening. The other aspect of the article that I found especially interesting was that the AP cross-referenced the sites included in the paper with pubic documents to see which specific companies are responsible for these sites and also went to some of the sites and collected their own video evidence. I'm not sure this helps with the communication of the study's findings, but I do think it helps tie the findings into the politics they discuss.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing this article with us and I am also agree with your thoughts. This article really gets into a serious environmental issue smack in the middle of West Texas, you know, the Permian Basin, where the U.S. does a ton of oil and gas stuff. It talks about a big problem with methane leaks and how they're like a turbo boost for climate change, not in a good way. Most of these leaks are from places where they're producing oil and gas, and this methane stuff is super bad for our planet. But here's the kicker, there aren't many rules about how to stop these leaks, and the companies get to call the shots. So, it makes you wonder, is the politics in Texas making it tougher to save our environment? Can we come up with some smart solutions to fix this mess before it gets even worse? Like, do we need stricter rules and cool new tech to stop these leaks? And how do we make sure protecting our environment and keeping the oil and gas industry happy can go hand in hand? It's a real brain-twister, tackling climate change and all.
ReplyDeleteBefore I began reading your blog post, I took a look at the scientific article and then the news article. The scientific article is filled with so much technical jargon that I found it often hard to follow. I very much agree with your point that a message can be lost when there is such an overwhelming amount of data being presented. I thought the image you selected to add into your post was very effective at showing the distributions of CH4 emissions, but the way the other data was presented had me feeling a little lost. Just like you said in your blog post, I found that the news article was very effective in how it communicated the larger picture of what the scientific article said. By acknowledging that its readers might not be familiar with the properties of methane and how it is a harmful greenhouse gas, they open a path to clearer (albeit still complicated) science communication. When people think of greenhouse gases, they normally think of carbon dioxide. I like that the news article made a clear comparison of the severity of methane and CO2 as greenhouse gases, so the readers had a clear understanding about the importance of this study (saying if CO2 was a broiler, methane would be a blowtorch).
ReplyDeleteI like the fact that the article tried to make the information digestible to the average person, even without a science background. I find the use of visual analogies like the one used about tanker trucks to be both striking and helpful. I also like that the article went into politics, as it gives the reader a well-rounded picture of the full scope of the issue. I think environmental chemistry is one of the few places where the science and policy go so hand-in-hand with each other, so being able to learn the science in a digestible way and then understanding how the science is or isn't being responded to or acted upon in the political arena is useful. We discussed in class Tuesday that Dupont was readily able to phase-out CFCs because they were working on an alternative already and this allowed them to cooperate relatively smoothly to prevent global environmental crisis. I wish more companies had alternatives so that things can actually get done instead of saying that they're "working on it" with no detail or evidence of progress.
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ReplyDeleteHi Ellen-thanks for sharing these articles! One of the things that stood out most to me in the AP article was the statement that “Just 10 companies owned at least 164 of those [oil and gas] sites…West Texas Gas owned 11.” To Rachel, Ali, and Roland’s points, it’s important that politics is tied heavily into this article. JL Davis, the late owner of West Texas gas, and other top level fossil fuel executives poured in millions of contributions for decades to Texas and nationwide leaders. An example of this is Texas Railroad Commission (RRC) Chairwoman Christi Craddock, who contrary to the commission name (it ceased all railroad regulations in 2005, according to the commission page), oversees and regulates all oil and gas industry activity in the state, and longtime Texas Governor Greg Abbott. When a powerful winter storm caused power outages for over 90% of state residents, natural gas pipelines supplied by the companies froze and were never authorized by Abbott or the RRC (which follows with your point that there’s “no evidence of [changing] procedure”). While I would also be eager to hear more on the chemistry behind climate change in articles, educating the public on the faces behind climate change denialism and their inaction on climate policy is crucial, at which the AP article mostly excels.
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