Oil and gas flaring became a political flashpoint in Alberta last week. We take a look at why
Canada vows to reduce methane emissions in the oil and gas sector 75 per cent by 2030
This story is part of the Prairies Climate Change Project, a joint initiative between CBC Edmonton and CBC Saskatchewan that focuses on weather and our changing climate.
The process of flaring in the oil and gas industry became a lightning rod in Alberta last week when the federal government unveiled proposed legislative changes to reduce methane emissions in Canada.
Against the backdrop of the UN Climate Change Conference in Dubai, federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault unveiled a blueprint for capping emissions in the oil and gas sector via a national cap-and-trade system that it says will set emissions limits without restricting production.
The framework proposes to cap 2030 emissions at 35 to 38 per cent below 2019 levels to reach the government's goal of reducing carbon emissions in the sector to net zero by 2050. The oil and gas sector is responsible for 28 per cent of Canada's emissions.
The Alberta government sounded alarm bells immediately with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith calling it an "intentional attack by the federal government on the economy of Alberta and financial well-being of millions of Albertans and Canadians."
Tucked away in draft regulations on methane emissions released earlier last week was a reference to flaring.
The proposed regulation would limit flaring to only when completely necessary, but the province says the proposed regulations would ban flaring altogether.
"Alberta will not accept nor impose a total ban on flaring at this time, as it is a critical health and safety practice during production," Smith and Environment Minister Rebecca Schulz said in a joint statement at the time.
"Any regulation that completely prohibits this is putting lives at risk. A total ban would also be costly, resulting in shut-ins and loss of production."
What is flaring and what would these proposed regulations actually do?
Put simply, gas flaring is the burning of natural gas as part of the oil extraction process.
Flaring can happen for a variety of reasons, from relieving pressure during the extraction of oil and gas, to a lack of equipment needed to capture, store and transport the gas for commercial use.
"Flaring is basically very simple, it's the combustion of waste or unwanted or undesired flammable gas," said Matthew Johnson, from the Energy and Emissions Research Lab at Carleton University.
"Basically, you've got some flammable gas, for whatever reason, you've deemed it's not economical to deal with and you need to get rid of it, so you just burn it on site."
The proposed regulation says that by 2027, facilities would "be required to design and operate systems to limit emissions during combustion and to eliminate routine flaring where feasible."
Johnson calls the province's focus on the directives around flaring in the proposed regulations a "red herring," saying that the concerns around safety are already addressed in the proposed regulations.
"Certainly there are cases, if you've got flammable gas and you need to get rid of it … they need to depressurize something relatively quickly or at some time, then typically that goes to a flare," said Johnson.
"There's a provision right in [the regulations], if it's an emergency situation … [flaring is] still allowed."
For facilities that need to regularly flare, Johnson says that too is covered in the proposed regulations.
"There's a loophole here in the federal regulation that you can still flare if you have some engineering study that says it's really not feasible to use that gas for useful heat or energy," said Johnson.
"From an environmental perspective, that kind of reads like a big loophole, and it's not really that different than the Alberta regulation, so this shouldn't be … the hill to die on."
Alberta Energy Regulator already monitors flaring
Those provincial regulations, outlined in the Alberta Energy Regulator report Directive 060, say that in 2022 the province reduced the limits on flaring by 50 per cent from the 1996 limits.
According to the AER, facilities must conserve gas if "the combined volume of flare gas and vent gas is greater than 900 m3/day per site."
Even though methane is only one component of natural gas, Johnson says that the base rate of methane burned off by flaring could help heat about 136 homes a day.
The Alberta Energy Regulator says it thinks the federal government's plan to limit flaring could be problematic to the industry.
"Flaring does not increase methane emissions — it reduces them compared to venting," wrote Renato Gandia, spokesperson for the Alberta Energy Regulator.
"Methane is usually what is being combusted at the flare, which converts most of the gas to carbon dioxide."
Gandia says flaring is a better option than venting, which is the controlled release of unburned gases into the atmosphere.
"Venting results in greenhouse gas equivalent emissions ... that are in the order of 10 times higher than flaring," said Gandia.
Flaring not a primary concern
Methane is considered to be about 80 times more harmful to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.
A recent report published by Johnson's lab found that Environment and Climate Change Canada has underestimated the amount of methane emissions produced by the Alberta oil and gas industry by 50 per cent.
But according to Johnson, the main source of methane emissions in the oil and gas industry is not flaring, but rather venting.
"In the oil and gas sector … there's lot of facilities, particularly heavy oil facilities that are designed to vent under normal operations, they release methane directly to the atmosphere," said Johnson.
"Those are the kind of worst offenders, particularly in the Lloydminster area."
Johnson says that venting from tanks accounts for 25 per cent of methane emissions, which is significantly more than the three per cent accounted for by the ECCC.
The study also found that four per cent of methane emissions are caused by venting from unlit flares.
Enforcement of new regulation
Under the proposed legislation, facilities would have two options to deal with excess methane — conserve it to be used in natural gas for heating and electricity, or combust it, which already happens at many facilities through flaring.
Even when combusted, flares still emit methane. According to the ECCC, flares are responsible for two per cent of methane emissions from the Alberta oil and gas industry, which is in addition to the carbon dioxide flares are responsible for.
But under the new regulations, facilities that "opt to destroy the gas are assumed to do so through optimizing their flares, installing a combustor, or installing an oxidizer," it says in the regulations, with the intent of reducing CO2 emissions.
Many companies have already started that transition.
"A lot of this is going to come down to just retrofitting those sites as quickly as possible," said Johnson.
"It's going to have a real cost, but the multiple studies have shown that cost is cheap on a dollar per tonne of CO2 emissions basis."
The regulations estimates that both venting and flaring requirements "would result in a total present value cost to industry of $3.3 billion between 2027 and 2040."
The proposed regulations are expected to take effect in 2027, and if oil and gas companies are not able to meet the targets, they risk facing fines, injunctions, or prosecution under the Compliance and Enforcement Policy under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.
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