Huntrieser, Heidi

Roiger, Anke-Elisabeth

Sauer, Daniel

Schlager, Hans

Zavala-Araiza, D.

Institute of Transport Research:Publications

The Methane-To-Go (CH4-To-Go) field campaign in the Persian/Arabian Gulf  –   Emissions from off- and on-shore natural gas and oil operations   H. Huntrieser1, A. Roiger1, D. Sauer1, H. Schlager1 and D. Zavala-Araiza2 [1] {Institut für Physik der Atmosphäre, Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR), Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany} [2] {Climate and Energy, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), Austin, TX, USA} The proposed campaign focuses on emissions from the off- and on-shore natural gas and oil operations in the Persian/Arabian Gulf region (~24-27 °N, ~50-56 °E), a wealthy region which contains about 50% of the world´s oil reserves. The flaring, venting and combustion processes produce large amounts of CH4, a greenhouse gas that is ~25 times more potent than CO2 and in focus of current mitigation strategies trying to reduce global warming. However, there is a huge lack of detailed CH4 measurements in the Gulf region and the contribution from this region to the global CH4 mass balance is presently unknown. Furthermore, recently a first global satellite-derived SO2 emissions inventory was established based on measurements with the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on the NASA Aura satellite showing a number of SO2 hot spots in the Persian/Arabian Gulf region. The Middle East region was also high-lighted as the region with the most missing SO2 sources compared to reported sources in the global emission inventories. The petroleum industry operations are mainly responsible for these emissions. In addition, the southern part of the Gulf region is known to be a region with a high density of ship traffic, emitting large but not yet quantified amounts of SO2, besides the traffic emissions from big cities along the coast as Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Worth mentioning is also the high sulphur content in fuels used for vehicles and ships in this region. In recent years the air quality in this region has worsened dramatically.    We plan the performance of airborne in-situ measurements with the German Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) Falcon-20 in autumn 2019 to probe the isolated, outstanding emission plumes from the different CH4 and SO2 sources in the southern part of the Gulf region as mentioned above (aircraft base in Bahrain or in Abu Dhabi, UAE). Besides the DLR-Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IPA) operation of a novel dual Quantum Cascade Laser (QCL) instrument based on laser absorption spectroscopy to measure CH4 and CO, and related trace gases as CO2 and C2H6 which can be used to distinguish between different CH4 sources (flaring, venting and combustion), an ion-trap chemical ionization mass spectrometer (IT-CIMS) is foreseen for the measurements of SO2. Both instruments operate with a high precision/accuracy and a temporal resolution of 0.5 to 1s which covers a horizontal distance of roughly 50-200 m during the flight. Furthermore, measurements of further trace species are foreseen (e.g. NO, NOy, O3 and aerosols) and simulations with particle dispersion models for flight planning and post analyses (FLEXPART and HYSPLIT).  The proposed campaign, which is funded by EDF/UNEP and DLR-IPA, includes both survey flights in the southern part of the Gulf region between Bahrain and UAE, as well as single plume study flights focusing on the emissions from single oil and natural gas installations. Furthermore, satellite validation is envisaged with the TROPOMI instrument on Sentinel-5P (focus on CH4 and SO2).  

The Methane-To-Go (CH4-To-Go) field campaign in the Persian/Arabian Gulf – Emissions from off- and on-shore natural gas and oil operations

https://elib.dlr.de/131358/1/abstract_AGU_Huntrieser_2018_v2.pdf

The Methane-To-Go (CH4-To-Go) field campaign in the Persian/Arabian Gulf – Emissions from off- and on-shore natural gas and oil operations

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