Methane Emissions Collaboratory Awards Project for Long-Term Monitoring of Methane Slip Emissions from Natural Gas Compression Engines

06/25/24 Des Plaines, IL

The Collaboratory to Advance Methane Science (CAMS), a research consortium administered by GTI Energy with leading energy companies, recently awarded $300,000 to the Energy Institute at Colorado State University (CSU) to identify opportunities to reduce the release of unburned methane in exhaust (known as “combustion slip”) from natural gas compression engines.

Lead by Dr. Tim Vaughn (PI) and supported by Daniel J. Zimmerle and Dr. Daniel B. Olson, the CSU project team will leverage their collective technical expertise to identify factors and events that result in elevated combustion slip above baseline performance by analyzing exhaust emissions measurements and parametric data from engines in active service.

The project will collect exhaust measurements to quantify the emission rate of unburned methane in engine exhaust through long-term and continuous emissions monitoring using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectrometers. Relevant operational and maintenance parametric data will also be collected from off-line and on-line sources such as maintenance logs and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems. This analysis will result in recommendations for operational strategies and practices with the potential to reduce combustion slip and ultimately, inform methane emissions mitigation practices.

About the Collaboratory to Advance Methane Science (CAMS)
CAMS is an industry-led collaborative research consortium working to advance methane-related science to better understand global methane emissions and the need for additional solutions. The collaborative conducts scientific studies addressing methane emissions from all sectors along the entire natural gas value chain, from production to end use, in basins across the country. Studies focus on detection, measurement, and quantification of methane emissions with the goal of finding opportunities for emissions reduction.

About GTI Energy
GTI Energy is a leading technology development organization. Our trusted team works to scale impactful solutions that shape energy transitions by leveraging gases, liquids, infrastructure, and efficiency. We embrace systems thinking, innovation, and collaboration to develop, scale, and deploy the technologies needed for low-carbon, low-cost energy systems.