Nord Stream Leak Is a Climate Disaster That Oil and Gas Repeat Daily
Global crude and gas producers emit roughly the same amount of methane leaked by the Russian pipelines every 1.5 days.
Planet-warming methane that’s bubbled up from the ruptured Nord Stream gas pipelines at the bottom of the Baltic Sea into the atmosphere is a climate disaster. But it’s one that’s repeated across the globe roughly every 1.5 days.
The oil and gas industry emits an estimated 80 million metric tons of methane each year during production, processing and transport of the fuels, according to the International Energy Agency’s Methane Tracker. That works out to about 220,000 tons each day — slightly less than the 300,000 tons the German government estimated last week would enter the atmosphere from the ruptured pipes.
“As massive as the Nord Stream methane release may be — and it does seem to set a new record — these emissions are dwarfed by what the oil and gas industry routinely releases,’’ said Antoine Halff, co-founder and chief analyst at Kayrros SAS, a geoanalytics company.