State-owned energy company Pemex released large amounts of methane from an oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico last year, with leaks recurring even after a warning by the UN, Reuters reported.
Previously unreleased data showed that months after two major methane leaks from the Zaap-C platform in 2022, the facility was still producing large and frequent emissions.
Reducing methane leaks from oil and gas infrastructure is one of the cheapest and most effective ways to decelerate climate change in the short term. Mexico is among many countries that have pledged to reduce methane emissions.
Methane is a much more powerful contributor to climate change in the short term than carbon dioxide, as it traps more heat in the atmosphere. Researchers noticed a methane leak from a Mexican platform in 2022, presumably related to an issue with a flare at the site.
Then that same year, a Mexican senator filed a criminal case against the CEO of Pemex, then Energy Secretary and head of the oil and gas sector’s environmental agency, citing Reuters articles. However, in Mexico, the status of the criminal case is not disclosed until it is decided.
A UNEP spokesperson reported that IMEO, a methane observatory, reported the first nine plumes to the Mexican government shortly after they were detected in July 2023. However, since UNEP publishes figures 45 to 75 days after detection, its data does not show whether there is a leak on the platform now.
Evan Sherwin, a research scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who studies methane emissions from oil and gas operations, argued that the leak on the Zaap-C was an unlit flare that should be technically feasible to resolve.
This is a fixable problem.
The UNEP monitoring system, established with the help of the United States, the European Union and other countries, imposes no consequences if notifications are ignored. According to UNEP, methane leaks on the Zaap-C platform were detected in April, May, July, August, September, October and November. It was not possible to determine the total volume of methane released.
According to the UN, between 13 and just over 100 tonnes of methane per hour were being released into the atmosphere at the time of detection.
Other major leaks have also involved unlit flares. Like other companies, Pemex flares or burns gas because it lacks the infrastructure to capture, process and transport it for other purposes. When gas is flared, methane, the main component, is converted into carbon dioxide and other elements that are less harmful to the environment in the short term.
Following reports of the 2022 detection, Pemex claimed that scientists mistook methane for nitrogen, which is the most abundant and harmless element in Earth’s atmosphere. However, scientists involved in the 2022 study responded to Pemex’s claim by saying that the sensor used to detect methane could not spot nitrogen.
