Mint Kunkel: Aerial Lidar measurement of methane emission rate distribution of oil and gas production infrastructure in Permian Basin

Methane emission flux rates from oil and gas production infrastructure follow a broad distribution ranging from below one kilogram per hour to thousands of kg/h. The mid-range of this distribution, roughly ones to hundreds of kg/h, is often under-represented due to limited detection sensitivity in some aerial campaigns and limited practical ability to quantify large emissions in on-site measurements. In this talk, we describe emissions data from an aerial LiDAR survey conducted by Bridger Photonics at 7920 oil and gas production facilities in the Permian Basin. Detected emission data from the LiDAR survey, conducted at a detection sensitivity of 2 kg/h at 90% probability of detection, are aligned and compared to the distribution measured by an intensive high-altitude solar infrared imaging campaign with a detection sensitivity that is found to be 300 kg/h at 50% probability of detection. Consistent with the difference in detection sensitivity, the LiDAR data show at least one emission at 38% of facilities surveyed, compared to detected emissions at 1.5% of facilities in the high-altitude solar IR campaign. The total emission rate from the scaled LiDAR survey is also found to be three times greater than that found from detections in the solar IR campaign.

Bio

Mint Kunkel is an optical scientist at Bridger Photonics, Inc. He received a Bachelor’s degree in physics from Carleton College in 2012 and a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from University of Minnesota in 2018. His research has included topics in coherent beam combining, beam shaper design, and fast optical sensing systems for microscope automation. He joined Bridger Photonics in 2021, where he works in research and development of hardware and analytics for remote sensing of methane emissions.