Global Oil & Gas: EU Rules on Methane Curbs May Boost LNG Industry – Exxon

New rules on curbing methane emissions in Europe’s energy sector may actually boost the case for liquefied natural gas and shouldn’t affect exports from the US.

“All of the progress around emissions reduction is positive for the gas business,” Peter Clarke, senior vice president for global LNG at Exxon Mobil Corp., said at the Wood Mackenzie Ltd. oil and gas conference in London. “Ultimately it delivers what we are selling, which is a lower greenhouse gas-intensity fuel, and takes coal out of the picture if you do it properly.”

His comments come as the environmental impact of methane — the main component of natural gas and one of the most potent greenhouse gases — comes under increasing global scrutiny. As EU negotiators this week struck a deal to curb and track methane emissions in the energy sector, a group of US lawmakers were pushing the Biden administration to assess the climate threat of massive natural gas export terminals being developed along the Gulf Coast.

Methane has more than 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide during its first two decades in the atmosphere and is responsible for approximately 30% of the Earth’s warming.

Minimizing those emissions across the industry is “absolutely achievable,” Clarke said Wednesday. (SOURCE: RIZGZONE)