Why flare gas

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We are committed to operating with sound environmental practices to protect the planet. Our culture promotes and encourages employees to act with integrity, responsibility, and compliance every day. Supplier Resources. Additional Resources. More information related to Baker Hughes. Stories 5 things you should know about flaring.

For starters, what exactly is the pole with a flame we often see at industrial sites? So why is the flare stack producing fire? Does flaring release carbon emissions? What are some common misconceptions about flaring? Combustion Efficiency CE and flare appearance 5. How can oil and gas companies continue to flare if they want to reduce emissions?

Related articles. The practice has persisted from the beginning of oil production over years ago and takes place due to a range of issues, from market and economic constraints, to a lack of appropriate regulation and political will. Flaring is a monumental waste of a valuable natural resource that should either be used for productive purposes, such as generating power, or conserved.

For instance, the amount of gas that is currently flared each year — about billion cubic meters — could power the whole of sub-Saharan Africa. Flaring persists to this day because it is a relatively safe, though wasteful and polluting, method of disposing of the associated gas that comes from oil production. Utilizing associated gas often requires economically viable markets for companies to make the investments necessary to capture, transport, process, and sell the gas.

Image: think4photop. Flaring may be required for safety reasons. Extracting and processing oil and gas involves dealing with exceptionally high, and changeable, pressures. During crude oil extraction, a sudden or dramatic increase in pressure could cause an explosion. Industrial accidents involving oil and gas, though rare, can result in destructive, dangerous, and long-lasting fires that are difficult to contain and control. Gas flaring allows operators to de-pressurize their equipment and manage unpredictable and large pressure variations by burning any excess gas.

In many cases, oil fields are located in remote and inaccessible places. These sites are hard to access, and they may not produce consistent or large volumes of associated gas that operators can use. This can make it logistically and economically challenging to transport associated gas to where it can be processed and utilized. Additionally, if oil production sites are small and dispersed over a large geographic area, capturing and using the associated gas is often viewed as prohibitively expensive.

In these instances, the associated gas is typically flared. Sometimes, where it's not possible to utilize the gas, the local geology will allow it to be conserved by re-injection back into the reservoir. However, this too is not always feasible despite recent technological advances. In some cases, it is economically and technically feasible to capture and utilize associated gas.

However, a country's laws and regulations might make it difficult for, or even forbid, companies from selling associated gas. For example, a company may have secured the rights to extract oil, but they may not own the associated gas produced during extraction. Although most oil-producing countries have established policies on gas flaring and emission regulation, implementation varies across regions.

In some areas with lax monitoring and enforcement of regulations, adherence to flaring protocols is largely ignored by key oil and gas production players. With the harmful effects of gas flaring on the environment, various economical alternatives have been introduced which involve using flare gas in other production processes. These gas flaring reduction methods are outlined below. Natural gas recovered from oil wells and landfill gases can be used to generate electricity.

There are various ways of converting flare gas to electricity which include:. Natural gas generated from oil and gas well can be injected into aged wells to restore dwindling natural formation pressure and maintain production outputs.

This self-sustaining cycle is quite economical as waste generated is minimal and overall process efficiency is boosted. Natural gas is the main raw material employed in petrochemical production processes. Rather than flaring associated gas from oil and gas wells, the flare gas can be channeled into the production of syngas, ammonia, hydrogen fuel for cars, or the manufacture of rubber, glass, steel, and paint.

Liquefying and storing associated gas is a safer and economical alternative to gas flaring. Following purification processes, liquefied natural gas can be stored for use both on an industrial scale and domestically. Compressed natural gas CNG refers to methane stored at high pressure. Methane derived from landfills and oil wells can be compressed at a pressure ranging between MPa and stored in cylinders.

This gas flaring alternative can be used to power vehicles which run on natural gas engines. GENERON is dedicated to providing all customers with access to technologies needed to optimize their industrial energy production processes. With our long-term experience in the oil and gas industry, we are uniquely positioned to effectively aid our partners.