Inaugural Issue
Inaugural Issue
Welcome reader – to the inaugural issue of ONE Future’s blog. Over the last few years you’ve likely heard a lot of chatter about the natural gas industry’s methane emissions, and that isn’t surprising. There are numerous negative, (sometimes false), stories about methane emissions. While you may be aware of ONE Future, you likely aren’t aware of what our coalition has been doing to significantly reduce methane emissions – which is why we started this blog, to begin communicating the truth. In fact, ONE Future companies have invested in methane mitigation technologies and work-practices for several decades and are voluntarily working to lower emissions to “ONE”% or less by 2025 – it’s part of our name!
To demonstrate that we are a coalition that takes action, we approached the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), a division of the U.S. Department of Energy, two years ago and asked to take part in an independent study on methane emissions in our industry. As part of the study, they gathered and used real data from our facilities. Today ONE Future announced the release of that report from NETL, Industry Partnerships and Their Role in Reducing Natural Gas Supply Chain Greenhouse Gas Emissions. The report analyzed the greenhouse gas (GHG) profile of the ONE Future facilities and evaluated methane abatement options.
The report is over 200 pages, but key takeaways include:
- The ONE Future protocol emission rate is .67% vs the national average methane emission rate of 1.62%. Further cost-effective measures could account for an additional 1.1 Bcf in methane emission reductions.
- If these additional measures are fully realized, the average life-cycle methane emission rate for ONE Future companies would be 0.65% – further enhancing the competitive advantage of U.S. natural gas, relative to other countries.
- Comparing the results with prior NETL reports, ONE Future companies delivered natural gas that was 15-18% lower on a CO2 equivalent intensity compared to the “average” U.S. natural gas rate on a 20-year basis.
This study demonstrates the positive impacts of ONE Future Coalition companies working to significantly reduce methane emissions; the bottom line is that the NETL report proves that we can achieve energy dominance using our abundant, affordable and American natural gas in an environmentally responsible manner.
If your company is part of the natural gas value chain and you want to make a difference in methane reduction, join us. ONE Future was formed when eight companies came together in 2014 with a focus to collectively achieve a science-based average rate of methane emissions across our facilities equivalent to one percent (or less) of total natural gas production. We have grown to 13 companies accounting for the some of the largest natural gas producers, transmission and distribution companies in the U.S. Our members operate in 11 out of the 19 production basins and other segments of the value chain operate in multiple regions of the country; they include Antero Resources, Apache, BHP, EQT Hess, Kinder Morgan, National Grid, Jonah, Southern Company Gas, Southwestern Energy, Summit Utilities, Statoil and TransCanada.
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