The, at nearly 3000 meters high. The dukes fits is famous for its breath taking panorama. And some of the cleanest air in germany at the summit, the highest Environmental Research station in the country. It includes an observatory that monitors the Earth Atmosphere throughout the year with a focus on potent Greenhouse Gases. The for the complex analyses physicist ralph system and from the Karlsruhe Institute of technology capture some the and directly into the interior of the mountain station with a system of gold coated mirrors. So what is the state of the earth delicate atmosphere . The in the laboratory, a spectrum meter separates the light and analyzes the individual wavelength with up to 140. 00 measurements per day. The team gains extremely precise insight into the composition of the atmosphere locus. So marcus, lets take a look at our current solar measurements for years. Theyve noted an increase in the concentration of Greenhouse Gases. This is whats going on. It turned out, well today, this is the sun life and i can see these fingerprint. The fingerprints from the beach gas produces typical lines in the solar spectrum. The deeper the blue gaps and the spectrum, the more gas was measured. You know exactly the double line. If you zoom in there again, the 2 lines, maybe hes very concerned about rising methane. This baton is items can be seen as quite a critical global warmer. On the one hand you might think is harmless because it disappears from the atmosphere within 10 years. Quite the opposite of Carbon Dioxide which lingers for thousands of years. So you might think its harmless. On the other hand, in your own, in those 10 years that meeting is in the atmosphere, its contribution to the greenhouse effect is at least a 100 times that of Carbon Dioxide. This include the after c, o 2, methane is the most important human cost Greenhouse Gas, and accounts for about a quarter of Global Warming to date. So where exactly does the color list order list gas come from . There are some Natural Sources in wetlands, nothing escapes as organic matter decomposes, and its also released in forest fires. But the massive increase in methane emissions since the beginning of the industrial era is due to humans. Large quantities are emitted in intensive live stock farming. And in the x direction and use of fossil fuels, the methane is the main component of natural gas as low as human activity has more than doubled the concentration of methane in the atmosphere to push to how much of this is due to fossil fuels. Doesnt really understand some kind of a mazda moment, does need his honest and what could be causing the extremely accelerated increase that researchers have been observing in the last 15 in years volunteer. These invite is on this. Let us use a decisive clue for ralph susan, lies in measuring another gas at thanksgiving week. A ton of the sites always extinguish nonsense when the sky you see now is the 2nd most abundant components of natural gas. After me saying, whats an agriculture in castle farming . It was. Theres no easy natal, im just i so the fact that theres a sharp rise and missing and 20 or 7 is this all the same time. Theres also a southern increase in the scene is very telling me time, we can actually then calculate the 40 percent of this, of the swing display of this entire increase and not in a skirt concentration from 20 a 7 till to date. This is caused by oil and Gas Production. So if it was international studies, confirm, there are more than 80000000. 00 tons of methane entering the atmosphere as natural gas every year. How can it be we launched an elaborate investigation in search of the source of these climate impacting emissions, natural gas, the allegedly clean the fuel is used to heat about a 3rd of europes homes, offices and stores, to feed the demand, an underground network of Gas Pipelines criss crosses our cities is natural gas escaping from this Distribution System on notice the Thomas Rockman of the Dutch University of food tract is trying to find out the measurements, taken by his american colleagues, have inspired the climate scientist to search for evidence in europe. The. His van is equipped with technology that continuously monitors the surrounding air. For traces of methane, the, the 2 researchers drive through the streets of tract constantly on the lookout for unusually high concentrations of methane, the its not long before the alert goes off. Oh yeah. Very good. The reading shows a sudden jump in methane level. Is there a natural gas leak nearby . Now they have to follow the trail. On the flip side, where exactly is the color listen to odorless gas coming from. With their immobile detector, they slowly work their way to the source. The post in Greenhouse Gas is seeping out through cracks in the pavement. Yep. 6 by 3 pm. Since that thing and methane levels are measured simultaneously, they can immediately distinguish natural gas from other methane sources, such as waste water. Right at the drain, the concentration is almost high enough to present an explosion risk. And this is, this is a big one here, right . Its a clear case. Natural gas is seeping out. The ones you think the bigger mess is gonna be a problem. We find these regularly on practically every else thing. We find a handful of leaks. Well now report that to the Gas Network Operator info and then, but theres probably a gas leak here and they can actually dig a hole and find out exactly where the lake is. And we can see that from the surface, of course, we can only see the point where its entering the at misty ever. Around this time, thomas workmans fines further leaks and several other streams that we have to be none, however large enough to oppose the risk to residents the the local gas supplier is unaware of all these leak. And although they themselves checks the pipes, the guy says, oh god, what does she be sure for the Gas Appliance motor to the straits of Different Team to move . And of course, it depends on what kind of pipeline materials theyve used drop. Its generally annual check stock and also the every 3 or 5 years on. So it means if a lake like that it goes and isnt found quickly, it can be there for months. So with this before its actually repaired, then the emissions has stopped winter and hopefully we certainly stop here. That was any, not a cities, it can be bookman. And several researchers from other universities have been tracking down methane leaks across europe and 11 cities to date. But they need to see the conclusion everywhere. Precious natural gas is escaping the grid. This could be largely prevented if gas suppliers carried out more frequent and thorough monitoring by 50 percent. But their investigations also clearly show that the municipal gas networks are probably only responsible for a small percentage of the 80000000. 00 tons of methane that escape in the form of natural gas. So wheres the rest coming from the in paris, we visit a company that specializes in Global Energy and environmental analysis. The startup k rose was founded to advise companies and investors in the oil and gas sector. One of the founders and one half was formally cheap analyst at the International Energy agency at k row supervisors. Clients with high quality data on the extraction, trade and consumption of oil and gas. But some of his clients began asking if and where methane was escaping in the process. His team of data analysts set out to investigate using publicly available information in the European Environmental satellites. Sentinel, 5 p has been orbiting the earth since october 2017. The instruments on board measure pollutants such as ozone, and formaldehyde, as well as methane once a day. This produces a map of methane concentrations across the globe. But this measures the total methane released over the years from Natural Sources. And man made sources such as agriculture and industry. Can the methane currently entering the atmosphere as natural gas be tracked down in this mountain of data . It changed its huge amount of processing, Artificial Intelligence modeling. You need to understand everything, you need to understand the whole industry. You need to understand how the weather and we by chance affect the dispersion of methane. So we combine all these inputs to develop algorithms that process the, the data Data Specialists and parents have recently succeeded in what was previously impossible. Theyve used computer programs to identify specific locations where natural gas, nothing is being released. These are found worldwide precisely where major production sites of natural gas and oil are located method. And these are problem is that it gets even for a long time, theres been there kind of a defensive digital voice mail saying, no, no, im not, im not doing anything thats saying no, those measurements cannot be right. Im doing, im good. And transparency is to selecting for many, many produces, including some of the majors. Does this also apply to companies in germany . We tried to gain access to one of the approximately 1100 production facilities in the country. After a rejection by oil diet, exxon, we negotiated with germanys largest oil and gas company ventures, how they finally, we obtained permission to visit a Gas Production facility, east of fremont. The are large quantities of methane escaping here and noticed the vendors how data has recently begun to address this question. Its voluntarily committed to inspecting its facilities for leaks once a year, which it did in germany for the 1st time. At the end of 2021 sensitive gas cameras are used to detect potential trouble spots. Using a gas cylinder technician marcel van to call like demonstrates how the camera works. Its the optical gas detection is based on the fact the gas is absorbed, atmospheric radiation, and become visible with in for read with conventional video technology, the gas is indivisible only and in for red mode doesnt show up as a black cloud, as the technicians systematically search the plant for leaks hundreds of valves, connections and pipelines have to be checked the in addition to the gas camera, a High Precision sniffing meter searches for the smallest leaks. The company says that a handful of minor leaks are usually detected during the to day inspection of such a plant. The gas camera doesnt register anything during our visit. Such images might not have been appreciated by the company. In the todds says, who do you want to name the missing ones who were funding on the companies are in fact trying to reduce emissions because its but you dont have to believe everything. They say exactly what im guessing is ill use these and thats why its important to carry out independent measurements and establish techniques that are properly tested so that companies can really deliver credible data, or do you want to name brokerage . So the bottom line is were still seeing an increase in methane company, and in the last year, more than ever before. And lets see, it hasnt got stack eyes just is here to help because you know, so where do the millions of tons of natural gas detected in the atmosphere come from not from germany, according to independent measurements. This is plausible, less than 0 point one percent of global oil and gas extraction takes place here. Europe as a whole, contributes only about 5 percent of global production. So it follows that europe share of global methane emissions from oil and gas would be relatively small. The major oil and gas reservoirs are found in russia and other states of the former soviet union. And in the middle east, with major producers in the persian gulf. In the past 15 years, production has increased significantly, especially in north america. Around a quarter of the world, oil and natural gas is now produced here much of it in the so called Permian Basin in south western us. This border region between the states of texas and new mexico is one of the Global Centers of this 1000000000 dollar industry. About 40 percent of us oil is produced here and natural Gas Production in the region has increased by 350 percent since 2011 new production records were announced in the 1st half of 2022. There are over 800000 wells in the Permian Basin rig upon rick. As far as the i can see how much natural gas along with methane escapes during production. The a Research Site at Colorado State university is dedicated to answering this question. So youre thinking over here, maybe for over a decade, engineer daniel assembly has been refining methods for detecting methane leaks in the industry. Second piece. Yes. So water over there to this and hes created a unique testing facility a. What at 1st glance looks like a typical oil and gas extraction facility is just a deceptively real facade. The, the natural gas does not come out of the ground here, but its delivered by truck it can be distributed throughout the site via hidden pipeline and release in a targeted manner. This allows researchers to test measuring devices and to trained technicians and detecting leaks and oil and Gas Production. Lets look at this as the, the vertical pipe. Theres a little valve sticking off horizontally on and they now know much more about the typical weak points and such a system here. Probably the big thing thats changed in the last 5 years is when we talked about fugitive emissions 5 years ago, people were interested in kind of small things like, you know, this joint or that joint or this piece of equipment. And that was where the focus was and what weve learned in the last 56 years is that the big problem is things we werent even looking at 5 years ago, where you end up with large emitters. Because some bell fails or some process failed. And you have a very large, youre talking about the companies that run those sites and the regulators. The companies that run decides the regulators that were constructing the programs. I would say even the n g os that were kind of looking at emissions didnt really quite understand the frequency and size large amounts of gas pouring unnoticed into the environment. Does this explains a huge increase of methane in the atmosphere. We turn to the International Association of oil and Gas Producers who secretary general him on hill. We made in houston for an interview. Were here today to talk about methane. Right . I mean, the oil and gas industry is a big and its, its international. Right . So do you represent, like all of it, we can confidently say that we represent our industry and we have members from every continent. Now we concern ourselves with looking across our membership and that membership and being as global as possible. To give a members the tool kits to be able to, as, as you know, accurately as possible, define the baselines with respect to what the current, me say, and emissions all, and then encourage them. And again, providing actual how deliverables in, in the form of a tool kit to allow them to start to put together, maintain emissions, reduction plans. And fundamentally, nobody in this sector doesnt believe theres not one Single Member company that i know of. That doesnt believe that this is a top priority for them. And its tough with the agenda for the work that, that, that theyre doing. It sounds exemplary, but none of the companies we contract in the us are willing to show us their production facilities. We receive one rejection after another. We respectfully decline participating in the production. Unfortunately, we cannot accommodate your request at this time. At these time, we are not able to accommodate these request. Can large methane emissions really remain on noticed . Be contact independent researchers, the scientists at the Environmental Defense fund, e d, f, a non governmental environmental organizations. It is equipped with a special camera. This helicopter will be searching today for methane emissions here in south western us. And all findings will be systematically documented by adf experts. David lion the helicopter is also frequently used by the us Environmental Protection agency. Adf has rented it for its research, with funding from Foundation Grants and donations the. Today the environmental list will be getting an impression of the site and be able to view the methane leaks in person. The, the helicopter is scheduled to fly over 60 production sites today in a sequence chosen in consultation with this scientists. The crew focuses on a facility where both gas and oil are being extracted. The gas camera can detect methane with in for read, the bingo. A continuous stream of methane is pouring from the emergency event of one of the tanks, the, the helicopter cru reports define to the ground station. Now the researchers set off the, fortunately, theyre able to get relatively close to the site. Often for holes can only be reached by private roads that are closed off to the public the. This production, well, like the vast majority here, is on man. Nonetheless, adf, researchers keep a safe distance from the rig, so as not to illegally enter the site. The, even from this distance, the special camera should be able to detect the venting gas. The, the, the diagnosis is easy. So at this site were seeing cost and emissions coming from these valves with the top of the tank. So i think what was happening at the site is this equipment over here is the separator, and it separates the oil and gas. And if its working, normally, it will have the oil go to the tanks and the gas go to the pipeline. So it can be sold to customers, but we things happen is the separator had a stuck valve. So the gas instead of going to the pipelines, was going to be the tank outside to the atmosphere. So not only is this causing methane emissions, but the company is losing products, so its really important for the companies to fix the equipment. In this case, the separator, they would stop the emissions and theyd sell more natural gas. The end of this discovery would not be the last of the day, the over and again, the crew finds faulty valves and leaks in tanks, the and a defective player. Were excess natural gas is incompletely burned. Yeah, its a very common problem so that the 2 biggest issues we see are abnormal emissions coming out of the tanks and then on with players. So in the permian, were using multiple times at the measurements at different scale. So im measuring the total emissions in the Permian Basin to measuring emissions at individual sites. The. The Environmental Defense fund is taking on what should be the governments jobs. For 2 years, researchers have been collecting data in texas and mexico. Larger areas were scanned by plains, scientists from the university of wyoming. Were tasked with documenting emissions from individual production sites and central Gas Processing plants. The helicopter has been deployed over and over again on methane detecting missions for adf. The unless layers are a major source of methane emissions, players are used for burning excess gas from oil production, which is often a cheaper solution than building transport pipelines for the gas. But extinguished or defective players released the pokemon Greenhouse Gas directly into the atmosphere. The engine numerous such incidents were detected by researchers. The evidence that e d. F and its partners have gathered is overwhelming and extremely inconvenient for the industry, the players, 10 to 15 times more methane is apparently being released. And so the western us then the companys claim, the adf continually updates its findings online. Well, also notifying the relevant operators there reactions, very many of the operators now are trying to figure out what is exactly causing these emissions and then figure it out. How they can stop the recurrence, but there still are a lot of companies who are not using measurements and really need to start figuring out where theyre emissions are coming from. So they can start reducing nervous. A David Zamarelli of Colorado State university has had similar experiences. What about the the fact, hey, what about the those, those heavy emissions . What, what can be done about those . Well, so for the large emitters, youve got 2 things. One of them is recognition that they even exist. Ok. So the aircraft overflights youre seeing and many basins, even satellite work youre seeing now, is highlighting that they exist 5 years ago. People just didnt, you know, they didnt believe they existed. Okay, so awareness is job one. Okay. We talked to dennis and my little see if you, me, tech. And he told me that the author right is on very often surprised how much stuff there is, especially when it comes to the heavy tail to the, to the, you know, super emitter stuff. That sounds like you Member Companies might not know a lot of their emissions. So i would disagree with you on back to actually i really would i call and speak for don a call and speak for the work that hes doing. I will, i can speak to really is the knowing the internals and the way the tom and the companies operate. It seems that Many Companies in the oil and gas industry are still in denial. But the new revelations are putting them under pressure at french Data Analysis company, k, rowse, the specialists have her find their methods to get it. Now they can even identify individual companies and plants from the raw data deliver daily by environmental satellites. The yellow stripes are kilometer long, methane plumes. Several tons of methane gas are blown into the atmosphere every hour by one single facility. And analysts are detecting such super emitters all over the world in practically all major oil and Gas Production regions. This is huge. We thought at the start at the start of a work that we would pick up maybe a dozen such events every year. We sometimes teach up, it doesnt a day we, we always become more than doesnt to reach. So those events of age a frequent that the intimate sense they dont last very long time. But in a few hours, because she permits or can meet as much as much company for that as tens of thousands of cost for an entire year. In south western us, in early 2022 emissions rose by a full 3rd. Analysts are also finding super emitters in the middle east. And in russia. These revelations have been met with resistance from the industry initially when satellites started revealing levels of emissions that were significantly above what the companies were reporting. There was an idea of disbelief, discomfort, and, and push back. Were now beyond that point, were now at this stage of coming up to terms with the stock reality, which is a problem the challenge because it costs a negative life on industry. But its also an opportunity because so much can be done. Can be done quickly, can be done cheaply and can be done in a way that can be communicators in a way that can be trusted. Technical solutions already exist. As seen at Colorado State university. Daniel simmer lee and his colleagues, they are show us Measurement Technology that can detect methane emissions cheaply and quickly. The several different manufacturers are currently having their sensors and cameras tested on campus. The goal is to have production facilities and pipelines, comprehensively monitored around the clock in contrast to Standard Practice to make the test as realistic as possible. The researchers are running a secret test protocol over several days. They repeatedly release different amounts of methane gas at different locations, or it says they dont measure 0, right . Thats the lower scratch, sort of just let the operators that the monitoring devices dont know when where or how much the the Technology Must be capable of alerting the facility operator at once. So they can stop the methane leak. The, it works, the camera registers methane problem solved. Im in the business of Leak Detection and repair. So i should be the grand champion of Leak Detection, right . But in reality, Leak Detection is probably the worst way to mitigate emissions, right . Okay its, its the equivalent of looking for the horses after they already have run out of the bar, right . So where you really want to be doing is using the information from your Leak Detection to improving your process. So the way to mitigate emissions is to start with controls on your site, the design of your site to make the emissions less probable. And then you come in at the end with Leak Detection, to find out when that control didnt work. And germany, such Continuous Monitoring methods are to get in use oil and Gas Companies have so far concentrated. Im looking for small leaks once a year. As a result, they too may be overlooking emissions of methane here as long as you look at the gap, a gap between the actual emissions and the emissions. We repeal things that are good and were working now to fill a gap somehow. In this regard, more, i mean console is half being defined under some sol says that we havent even been aware of course we working on the gaps and the wind. These initiatives exist to be able to such that we understand that we want to improve soviet and berlin. A Non Profit Organization is closely monitored during the activities of the industry, environmental action. Germany has been calling for some time for more consistent action against methane emissions from the oil and gas industry. We ask its executive director, sasha mueller craner. What he thinks of the companys efforts is we just good to. Theres now a voluntary initiative on the pallets of the industry to, to 50 saying we want to assess the frontier loan just populate mountain method in addition to voluntary commitments. We also need legal regulations of costs. And the thing is ultimately its about taking action that costs money wont come when push comes to shuffle. So its most binding exponent, tre, 5, in the time, the cost of the me, signing reduction measures, going to be taken time of it. So thats why we need clear cut legislation, Alec Association that you can, the organization has criticized the fact that companies in germany are not even obliged to measure their methane emissions. The e u is working on a uniform methane strategy. But this has been the subject of behind the scenes wrangling for years. The draft resolution requires companies to measure their emissions and stipulates that no more natural gas may be deliberately discharged. This is still common practice in many countries during maintenance work. But theres another way to handle that. Here, the Long DistanceNetwork Operator o g e is building a new compressor station on an active gas pipeline, which is full of natural gas. The nearest location where the pipe can be shut off, is 17 kilometers away. In order to open the pipelines safely, the natural gas, more than 500. 00 tons of it must be removed from this section in the 17 kilometer section of pipeline which has been shut down and is now being evacuated when it comes to empty of natural gas. You could supply 530. 00 Single Family homes with gas for a year. And in the past about 10 to 15 years ago, you would have basically ended up releasing that gas into the atmosphere in places where thats still common. Russia, for example, a super emitter then shows up in the methane satellite imagery by investing and such trucks, o g e, has greatly reduced venting and its own operations. Immobile compressors use High Pressure to transfer the natural gas between pipeline sections. The gas is no longer loss. Controlling emissions doesnt only make economical sense. Do you hear me say an initiative contains a number of useful things most for the 1st time maintained emissions, and that he used to be recorded and reported in a standardized form and also to be verified. But the very important things missing. Most importantly, the most natural gas is not produced in a good example voted on most to maintain emissions done to kind of within the utah within the producing countries. And sort of in the European Union can only cover a small part of its natural gas needs through its own production. The big suppliers are norway and russia, who before the ukraine war supplied about 40 percent of europes gas needs. But no matter where germany and the you have imported their gas from to date, theyve had little or no influence on the suppliers, methane emissions. Yet the fact remains high. Standards for clean production are imperative. If we wished to combat Global Warming to you, you would basically have to introduce mandatory labeling from natural gas being imported into the do you have to check closely so our pricing is transparent. How much meantime escaped during production . Whats the climate compatibility with oil focus on securing our energy needs . And if we come to fault to lose sight of our climate target . And sometimes i have the feeling that the climate get difficult for me. I think the sobering conclusion of our research, more than 80000000. 00 tons of methane continue to escape into the atmosphere as natural gas year after year. All of it preventable the gas causes further Global Warming and at the same time is lost as a valuable energy source. The only because is a new fuel power list. When you think that was needed as the restructuring of the entire industry and transport sectors. And it can be done individually, this, it can only be tackled at the political level, and it would have to be globally coordinates it again politically. And you cant help noticing the joint action Global Politics is a bit restricted right now. Is all this left is to hope that at some point things will progress progress significant lee, we dont have much time would be obviously a few sites the, the somalia has been hit hard by its own way to the side of the issue. But there is a way out affordable the celebration of sea water and initiative by somali. Businessman demonstrates how it can be done. The code for cook in 30 minutes on dw the data. But well tell you we are happy that we are boxing the story. We have a, getting a visa is more difficult than finding gold hosted to use that force and for the future feelings about whats going on in the industry. Instead of being discussed across the continent, dw, and use africa every friday on the w, the, the, the, this is the, the we news line from berlin, russias black sea naval headquarters, and flings after a Ukrainian Missile striking process Defense Ministry says one service man is missing after a long range missile has the building and sylvester pool and the amex crimea, and peninsula also coming up china in syria. I agree to closer ties as syrian leader of bizarre. Ill also visit china for the 1st time. Nearly 20 years will ask what the 2 sides hoped to gain and germanys men football team