Energy & Science
Large Methane Plume Detected Over Southern Iraq
The Mideast oil and gas producer ranks among the biggest emitters of the super-warming greenhouse gas
A gas flare at the Zubair oil field, southwest of Basra in Iraq.
Photographer: Haidar Mohammed Ali/AFP/Getty Images
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Satellites detected a large release of super-warming methane gas over southern Iraq last month.
The methane cloud, spotted by geoanalytics firm Kayrros SAS using European Space Agency satellite data, was halfway between Baghdad and Basra, an oil and gas hub in southern Iraq. The rate of release was about 130 tons per hour, which has approximately the same climate-warming impact as 6,500 U.K. cars running for a year.