Presenting abstracts from recent scientific publications relevant to the field of emission control. The full article title, journal, and date of publication will facilitate access to the complete work. Abstracts may be truncated for space reasons.
By KCI Editorial
Flexible Operation and Fugitive Methane Emissions Limit the Potential of Power Plant Carbon Capture and Storage
The Electricity Journal, September 2025
To fully decarbonize electricity generation, there is a need to meet electricity demand at times of low solar and wind availability. Natural gas combined cycle (NGCC) generation with carbon capture and storage (CCS) that reduces power plant CO2 emissions is one technology proposed for this purpose. However, CCS does not capture all power plant CO2 emissions and does not address methane emissions that occur upstream of NGCC power plants.
Furthermore, the cost of CCS is often not evaluated at capacity factors that represent likely use cases of NGCC power plants in low-carbon grids. Therefore, we evaluate the effect of uncaptured fugitive methane emissions on the climate benefits of CCS and the role of NGCC capacity factors on the economics of CCS. Accounting for time- and region-dependent methane leakage, we find that CCS reduces system-level greenhouse gas emissions between 21 % and 88 %, with remaining climate impacts being primarily due to uncaptured methane emissions. At average United States methane leakage rates of 2.95 %, CCS reduces system-level greenhouse gas emissions by 47–71 %.
In addition, we estimate that CCS-related capital and operating expenditures only make CCS cost-effective at high-capacity factors and in the presence of financial supports such as the California cap-and-trade program and United States 45Q tax credits. These findings highlight significant technical and economic challenges of using NGCC with CCS to achieve full grid decarbonization.
Quantification of Methane Emissions from Typical Natural Gas Stations Using On-Site Measurement Technology
Journal of Pipeline Science and Engineering, June 2025
Natural gas transmission systems are the main source of methane emissions in the oil and gas industry. Methane, as the second most potent greenhouse gas, makes a strong contribution to climate change. The hydrogen flame ionization detector and Hi-Flow sampler (a large flow methane detector) technologies were used to measure fugitive methane emissions in five distinct categories of stations in natural gas transmission pipelines in China. The methane emission rate of different components was quantified, enabling a comparison of methane emission characteristics across different stations. The resulting data was used to deduce a correlation equation between the methane concentration and the emission rate of various components.
The leakage probability of components in the surveyed stations ranged from 2.54% to 7.77%. Notably, the leakage probability of liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminals was considerably higher than that of the other stations. A one-way analysis of variance revealed significant differences in methane emission rates between components with different processes. The bootstrap method was used to calculate the mean methane emission rates and 95% confidence intervals for each component. The mean methane emission rates and 95% confidence intervals for valves, flanges, connectors and open-ended lines were 26.43 (15.86, 38.56), 35.84 (23.36, 50.19), 4.90 (3.43, 6.73), and 30.76 (18.62, 44.19) kg/a, respectively.
In conclusion, the total fugitive methane emissions …
Research on the Effectiveness of LDAR and Precise Emission Reduction Strategies of Five Typical Petrochemical Companies
Journal of Cleaner Production, January 2025
Leak Detection and Repair (LDAR) is an essential control measure for the fugitive emission management of VOCs in petrochemical companies and has been implemented in China for over a decade. However, there is a notable absence of authoritative research concerning the leak ratio of fugitive emissions from affected components of affected equipment and pipeline components within petrochemical companies.
This study selected five typical petrochemical companies as subjects of research, with the processing scale and processing routes serving as the two main threads. Based on more than 6 × 106 pieces of measured data, a systematic analysis was conducted to assess the fugitive leak ratios at affected components, using the correlation equation method. The results indicated that the number of static components such as connectors, flanges, and valves accounted for 97.9% of the total number of affected components. Simultaneous, the average leak ratio for all affected component was approximately 0.2%, which was below the average leak ratio (1.5%) of Chinese refineries. When examining the leak ratios from different processing routes, it was observed that fuel-type petrochemical companies have the highest leak ratio (0.2%) due to their earlier establishment, which is influenced by the limitations of the equipment installation technique in the early years as well as wear and tear of the affected equipment and pipeline components. The refining-chemical integration type companies tend to…