A Canadian company that uses satellites to detect sources of methane emissions around the world said on Wednesday that it had detected one of the largest artificial emissions of powerful greenhouse gas ever seen from a coal mine. in Russia earlier this year.
Montreal-based GHGSat said one of its satellites, known as “Hugo”, observed 13 methane plumes at the Raspadskaya mine in Siberia on January 14th. The incident likely caused about 90 tons of methane to erupt into the atmosphere within an hour, the company calculated.
“This was a really, really dramatic show,” Brody Wight, GHGSat’s director of energy, landfills and mines, told The Associated Press.
Reducing methane emissions from fossil fuel facilities has become a priority for governments seeking to take swift and effective action against climate change. This is because methane is a powerful gas that traps heat, followed by carbon dioxide, which stays in the atmosphere longer.
Our satellites measured 13 different methane pens in a single pass, with a size ranging from 658 to 17,994 kg / h 🛰️ If the total release rate were maintained for a year, the mine would emit 764,319 tons of CH4, enough to feed 2.4 million homes. ⁇ pic.twitter.com/rVmBNdbjBi
– @ghgsat
GHGSat said the feathers detected in Raspadskaya could have been released intentionally, as a safety precaution, as the gas could seep out of the mines and ignite with potentially deadly results. Two methane explosions and a fire killed 91 people at the mine in 2010, one of the worst disasters of its kind in the post-Soviet era.
Companies can prevent the uncontrolled release of methane through best practices. Captured gas can be burned as fuel, reducing its impact on global warming.
More leaks
GHGSat said it measured more plumes over the mine during subsequent overflights in the following weeks, although they did not reach the same “ultra-emission” scale seen on January 14th.
“Even if it’s only for a short period of time, it doesn’t take long to be a significant issue,” Wight said.
Manfredi Caltagirone, who heads the UN’s International Environment Program’s Methane Emissions Observatory, said he did not know of any major methane releases from a coal mine.
A model of the GHGSat satellite, which is the size of a microwave oven. (Kyle Bakx / CBC)
“If this event is the result of an accumulation of methane that has been released all at once instead of for several days, the environmental impact would be the same as if a smaller feather were constantly released for several days,” he said. dir Caltagirone. , who did not participate in the GHGSat observation.
“But from a security perspective, it’s worrying,” he said, citing recent mine blasts in Poland that killed 13 people.
However, the release was probably a very rare event or else other methane-measuring satellites would have picked them up as well, Caltagirone said.
GHGSat said it alerted the Raspadskaya mine operator to its findings, but received no response. The operator also did not respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
In recent years, several private and government satellites have been launched to help identify methane leaks and raise awareness about the risks they pose to the climate and human health.
In one of the most reported methane leaks in the United States, a 2015 explosion at a natural gas storage facility in California made residents of the San Fernando Valley sick and evacuated 8,000 homes.