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Burying bone of contention: Alberta, Canada negotiate methane
Gary Park for Petroleum News
Agreement on anything these days between the Alberta and Canadian governments is a rare event, thus the settlement of a feud that has spanned years over controlling methane emissions is a milestone.
The deal bringing emissions of the potent gas from Alberta’s oil and natural gas operations into line with federal minimum standards generated praise from Canada’s Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson for the tone of negotiations that he said were “collaborative and constructive.”
Alberta Environment Minister Jason Nixon said that even “minor changes” to the initial proposal were “nothing of significance.”
Regulations signed off by the Canadian government and the other nine provinces have been in effect since Jan. 1.
Wilkinson said stumbling blocks that surfaced during negotiations included mostly technical disagreements over testing and monitoring emissions.
Canada’s fossil fuel industry has made some headway in lowering what are known as “fugitive” emissions from 70 million metric tons in 1998 to 54 million mt in 2009, at which point progress was stalled.
At that stage, Alberta (the source of 33 million mt), Saskatchewan (15 million mt) and British Columbia (4 million mt) opted to make their own rules, while the federal government set a goal to slash the emissions by 40% from 2012 levels by 2025, that would have been the equivalent of shutting down all of Canada’s oil refineries.
Alberta further tightens standards The Boston-based Clean Air Task Force estimated that Alberta’s rules would have yielded a 32% cut, or 80% of Canada’s minimum target.
On methane Alberta said its rules were “stronger and cheaper” than those of the federal government.
In agreeing to further tighten its standards, Alberta won over the senior government, yielding a win-win-win for Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the environment.
Jan Gorski, a senior analyst at the independent Pembina Institute, said that if Alberta would go beyond the current methane targets it would demonstrate “global leadership” and help improve the tarnished image of its oil and gas sector.
Tim McMillan, president of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said the Alberta “framework supports a flexible, results-oriented approach to reducing emissions while stimulating technology and innovation essential to meeting our environmental performance goals at this critical time.”
Releasing methane directly into the atmosphere is rated as worse for climate change than end-use combustion because when the gas is burned it turns into less harmful carbon dioxide.
As the principal component of natural gas, methane is highly valuable, thus limiting leaks is also seen as a cost-effective way to cut greenhouse gas output.
- GARY PARK
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