Global Supply Chain Carbon Accounting

The key to effective global climate action is accurate carbon accounting. Carbon Accounting refers to accurate measurements of greenhouse gas emissions embedded within a system - these systems could be a single product (e.g., car), a supply chain (e.g., LNG), or individual facilities (e.g., cement production plant or an oil refinery). Accurate carbon accounting is necessary for policies such as cap and trade or border adjustment taxes, or any target-based emissions reduction strategy such as methane fees or emissions intensity targets. Recent technological advancements have led to the develop of responsible gas or certified gas initiatives that attempt to verify that operators have achieved low methane emissions. The SET lab particularly focuses on developing effective protocols, models, and tools to account for methane and carbon dioxide emissions across oil and gas supply chains. Specifically, we address the following key questions:

  1. How can we use multi-scale, multi-technology measurements to develop quasi-real time emissions estimates?

  2. How can we improve official greenhouse gas emissions inventories and reconcile with measurements?

  3. Can we develop universal protocols to estimate methane emissions across individual supply chains?

Hiring Status: The SET lab is significantly expanding its research activities in accurate Carbon Accounting and will be hiring senior research scientists, data and visualization experts, post-docs, and PhD students. If this is a topic of interest, please reach out to Dr. Ravikumar via email with your CV and a short note about your interest.

Publications:

  1. J. Wang, W. Daniels, D. Hammerling, M. Harrison, K. Burmaster, F. George, and A.P. Ravikumar (2022). Multi-scale methane measurements at oil and gas facilities reveal necessary framework for improved emissions accounting. ChemRxiv.

  2. J.S. Rutherford, E.D. Sherwin, A.P. Ravikumar, G. Heath, J. Englander, D. Cooley, D.. Lyon, M. Omara, Q. Lang tt, and A.R. Brandt (2021). Closing the gap: Explaining persistent underestimation by US oil and natural gas production-segment methane inventories. Nature Communications 12 4715.