In
August 2012, two Australian research scientists attached a highly sensitive
spectrometer to a vehicle with a GPS tracker and took a 700 kilometre
drive around gas fields in Queensland.
Starting
at 3.30am in the morning, Dr Isaac Santos and Dr Damien Maher, of Southern
Cross University, wanted to measure the levels of methane and carbon dioxide in
the air around coal seam gas fields operated by BG Group, formerly
known as British Gas.
Twelve
hours of driving took them past fields with about 300 wells that tap coal seams
to release gas, often with the help of hydraulic fracturing
(fracking) technology.
They
also drove past other areas where you might expect levels of methane to be high
such as wetlands, fields of cows and sewage treatment plants.
The
researchers found methane levels at the gas fields were triple the
background levels.
The
chemical fingerprints of the methane they detected near the gasfields — known
as isotopic signatures — matched those from the gas produced from
the wells.
Methane
is important because as a greenhouse gas it is more than 20 times as potent as
carbon dioxide over the course of a century.
Predictably,
the industry group Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association
(APPEA) attacked
the scientists claiming — wrongly — that they had targeted the gas
fields while ignoring other potential sources of methane.
At
that time the Federal Resources Minister was Martin Ferguson.
He
joined in the attack on the scientists, characterising them as unprofessional
media opportunists — a claim he had made without having actually read
the scientists' submission.
Data from this study indicates that
unconventional gas may drive large-scale increases in atmospheric CH4
(methane) and CO2 concentrations, which need to be accounted for when
determining the net [greenhouse gas] impact of using unconventional
gas sources…
Considering the lack of previous
similar studies in Australia, the identified hotspots of GHGs and the distinct
isotopic signature within the Tara gas field demonstrate the need to fully
quantifyGHG emissions before, during and after CSG exploration
commences in individual gas fields.
The
findings are identical to the initial publicized research. The response from APPEA is
similarly identical.
The
gas industry lobby group has again
attacked the scientists, repeating the criticisms addressed two years
previously as if time had stood still.
Astonishingly, APPEA reported
it had written to Southern Cross University Vice Chancellor Peter Lee two years
ago with a series of questions, but “no response was ever received”.
In
fact, DeSmogBlog understands Lee wrote back to APPEA on 20 November
2012, defending the work of the scientists at his university and defending
their right to speak about what they had found.
The Sydney
Morning Herald reported at the time that Lee had written back,
rejected APPEA’s assertions and also accused them of issuing a
“misleading” press release.
According
to APPEA,
the group asked four questions of the researchers and their findings. The
questions seem to me to be more an effort to produce doubt, rather than to
produce responses. Repeating them now when all the answers are in plain sight
adds to this suspicion.
APPEA first
asked if the work was being peer reviewed – the answer to that now
seems clear.
APPEA asked
if the university would “provide GPS data highlighting exactly where
and how many readings/measurements were recorded in the Tara area, on which
roads and when”.
The original
submission clearly shows detailed maps of where the measurements were
taken. Maher told DeSmogBlog that the university had also
shared GPS and data with the Queensland state government’s GasFields
Commission. One of the commissioners
is Rick Wilkinson, the chief technical officer at APPEA…..
APPEA asked
if the researchers had taken into account “other potential sources of emissions
such as naturally-occurring hydrocarbon seeps” even though it was made clear in
the original submission that the researchers had done this by taking
measurements at locations including “wetland, sewage treatment plant, landfill,
urban area and a bushfire”.
Maher said:
We surveyed 100’s of km’s inside and
outside of the gas fields. The high methane concentrations were not found
directly outside of the gasfield, in spite of identical geology and
topography, etc.
Our research cannot definitively say
how the gas is escaping to the atmosphere. What we can say is that it had the
identical chemical fingerprint to the gas within the coal seam, and that we did
not find any similarly elevated concentrations directly outside of the gas
field, i.e. as soon as we drove out of the gas field theCH4 (methane)
concentrations returned to near background levels for 100s of kilometres.
The data indicates that [the increased
levels of methane] is related to some of the activities or infrastructure
within the gas field which is leading to gas of an identical chemical
fingerprint toCSG being released to the atmosphere……
Finally, APPEA said
it had asked if “other potential sources of emissions such as large scale
feedlots” had been taken into account. A section of the journal paper read that
during the surveys:
…
a number of other potential point sources were observed including the following:
vehicle emissions (from passing cars), wetlands, a combined sewage treatment
plant and landfill site, an abattoir and cattle holding complex, urban areas,
and a bushfire.
