Abby L. Harvey
GHG Monitor
5/2/2014
The Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) is making up to $30 million available to help U.S. teams develop new detection systems for methane emissions associated with the production of oil and natural gas. The new MONITOR (Methane Observation Network with Innovative Technology to Obtain Reductions) program is intended to help address anthropogenic methane emissions that total 8.8% of all greenhouse gas emissions. “If successful, MONITOR’s technologies could accurately and cost-effectively measure methane emissions and provide a detection network to mitigate the release of this greenhouse gas into the atmosphere,” a DOE release issued this week says.
The program seeks to fund state-of-the-art technological research for the development of “sensing system,” as currents technologies available have varied degrees of selectivity, sensitivity, accuracy and cost. Cost, according to the Funding Opportunity Announcement for the MONITOR program, remains the primary barrier to widespread utilization of methane measurement. The end goal of the program is to develop technology for the early detection of methane or natural gas leakage at an established a cost metric of $3,000 / site / year for basic functionality. Other capabilities of interest are methane selectivity, speciation capability, thermogenic/biogenic differentiation, continuous measurement and enhanced stability. A submission deadline for concept papers is set for June 13.
