10th September: The weekly roundup on all things flaring:

Capterio news:

• In 52 days, that world will come together at COP26 and pledge yet more climate promises. But at the 2015 Paris Climate Summit, 11 countries promised to reduce gas flaring, seven of which, actually increased flaring. So in the run-up to COP26, we at Capterio have published an article looking in depth at the seven key actions that countries need to take to ensure they meet their flare reduction commitments. Click to read our in depth article “how a focus on gas flaring at COP26 can accelerate decarbonisation“.
  
  
• Capterio’s data and insight featured in an article “Oil industry flaring needs immediate action to keep net-zero hopes alive” published by Energy Monitor. Echoing the previous bullet point, John-Henry Charles, FlareIntel lead said, “I hope COP26 can provide a forcing mechanism to really begin to make progress on flaring […], it will also help countries to reduce flaring now if they want to keep trading with places like the EU, which will likely soon adopt carbonborder adjustment mechanisms“.
  

Industry news:

• TotalEnergies signs a $27 billion deal in Iraq to produce more oil, capture flared gas and install solar. We estimate that they plan to recover 2-4 BCM per year of gas in the first phase of the project from fields near to Basra, and this should help to reduce emissions and provide more reliable power to Iraq. Big congratulations, TotalEnergies. Below is a map of the flaring in the greater Basra area.

• Interesting to see the exploration success from Naftogaz with a new carbonate play opened up in Ukraine (see LinkedIn post with a video). We’ve been tracking this flare with FlareIntel – but wonder for how long companies will announce their success with this visible sign of waste?
  
  
• Nigeria seems to have upped its commitment to reduce gas flaring – now by 2025 according to Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva who said “we are on course to achieve complete elimination of gas flaring by 2025“. We admire this commitment but note that Nigeria also needs to incentivise investment and start to enforce existing flaring penalties to have a chance of making this happen

Above: map of flares in the vicinity of Basra. from Capterio, a flare capture company. Underlying data from FlareIntel using the Colorado School of Mines NightFire algorithm”.