Innovative AP team sheds light on methane ‘super emitters’ — invisible and virtually unregulated
In this photo made with an Optical Gas Imaging thermal camera, a plume of heat from a flare burning off methane and other hydrocarbons is detected in the background next to an oil pumpjack as a cow walks through a field in the Permian Basin in Jal, N.M., Thursday, Oct. 14, 2021. (AP Photo/David Goldman)
By Michael Biesecker, David Goldman, Helen Wieffering, Mike Pesoli and Dario Lopez
It’s difficult enough to write a compelling story about a highly technical subject, harder still to produce a rich visual package on a literally invisible threat — but an all-formats team of AP journalists rose to the challenge.
AP investigative reporter Michael Biesecker was looking for ways to tell the story of the dangers of methane emissions — an extremely potent greenhouse gas that is not adequately regulated. He learned that a handful of companies have been tracking methane using an infrared spectrometer, which measures wavelengths in light to detect and quantify methane in the atmosphere.
Patience and persistence paid off as Biesecker developed a relationship with Carbon Mapper — a joint venture of NASA and university researchers — which shared data with AP on 533 methane “super-emitter” sites in the Permian Basin,a 250-mile-wide expanse along the Texas-New Mexico border. Investigative data journalist Helen Wieffering then mapped those locations,giving Biesecker and photographer David Goldman a trail to follow when they visited the region.
The pair carried a specialized infrared camera that can detect the invisible gas — hardly standard-issue AP gear. Biesecker had persuaded the company that makes the camera to lend it to AP,and Goldman taught himself to use it,resulting in mesmerizing visuals of an otherwise unseeable threat.
Wieffering and Biesecker then cross-referenced the data from Carbon Mapper with state drilling permits,air quality permits,pipeline maps, land records and other public documents to piece together the corporations most likely responsible.
Patches of land that are home to oil pumpjacks dot the landscape of the Permian Basin in Midland, Texas, Oct. 11, 2021. Carbon Mapper, a nonprofit partnership that includes NASA, research universities and the State of California, documented massive amounts of methane venting into the atmosphere from oil and gas operations across the Permian, a 250-mile-wide bone-dry expanse along the Texas-New Mexico border that is the largest oil and gas producing region in the U.S. – AP Photo / David Goldman
A lone plant grows from the dry soil as a flare burns off methane and other hydrocarbons in the Permian Basin in Pecos, Texas, Oct. 13, 2021. There is now nearly three times as much methane in the atmosphere than in pre-industrial times. The year 2021 saw the biggest single increase ever. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Well site supervisor Jason Brown looks out on the Permian Basin from the control room of Latshaw oil drilling rig #43 in Odessa, Texas, Oct. 13, 2021. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Forehand Kory Mercantel works on Latshaw drilling rig #43 in the Permian Basin in Odessa, Texas, Oct. 13, 2021. The Permian is the top oil and gas producing region in the United States. On any given day, about 500 rigs are drilling new wells within the basin to boost production. – AP Photo / David Goldman
The Texas state flag flies above workers at Latshaw oil drilling rig #43 in the Permian Basin in Odessa, Texas, Oct. 13, 2021. More than 5,000 new well-drilling permits were issued in the Texas portion of the Permian in 2021, as demand for fossil fuels rebounded after a COVID-era slump. Numbers from the first quarter of 2022 show the industry on pace to eclipse that figure. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Flares burn off methane and other hydrocarbons at an oil and gas facility in Lenorah, Texas, Oct. 15, 2021. Massive amounts of methane are venting into the atmosphere from oil and gas operations across the Permian Basin, new aerial surveys show. The emissions endanger U.S. targets for curbing climate change. – AP Photo / David Goldman
A crop duster flies over a field near an oil well in the Permian Basin in Lenorah, Texas, Oct. 15, 2021. Methane emissions are notoriously hard to track because they are intermittent — an old well may be wafting methane one day, but not the next. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Pipes sit in a cotton field waiting to be installed for new oil pipelines in Lenorah, Texas, Oct. 15, 2021. The frenetic search for more gas and oil is happening just as President Biden and world leaders are promising to cut methane emissions across the world. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Utility poles line a road through the Permian Basin in Mentone, Texas, Oct. 14, 2021. The Permian, a 250-mile-wide bone-dry expanse along the Texas-New Mexico border, was the bottom of a shallow sea a billion years ago. – AP Photo / David Goldman
A resident sits by the pool at the Ocean Front RV Resort in Kermit, Texas, Oct. 13, 2021. The oil and gas boom has led to the creation of “man camps,” where workers and sometimes their families live in sprawling tracts of temporary housing in the middle of the desert. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Tristan Yperman holds her son, Grant, 1, in the makeshift yard outside their RV at the Ocean Front RV Resort in Kermit, Texas, Oct. 13, 2021. Yperman’s husband is an engineer with a construction contractor widening the highway into Kermit, a sleepy desert crossroads that has seen its population grow with the oil boom. Spots in the 291-space RV park go for $780 a month, $1,200 for a small one-room cabin. “We never really know where we go next,” said Yperman who is expecting their second child in March. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Cowboy hats hang from a deer head next to a portrait of John Wayne at Big John’s Feed Lot in Big Spring, Texas, Oct. 15, 2021. At the burger and barbecue hut the parking lot was filled at lunchtime with gas-guzzling American-made pickup trucks. “Can you imagine anyone in here driving an electric car?” asked Brenda Stansel, the owner, who insisted Trump was still the rightful commander-in-chief. Asked if she believed in climate change, Stansel responded: “I believe in God.” – AP Photo / David Goldman
A statue of Jesus stands next to graves in a cemetery beside an oil and gas facility in Pecos, Texas, Oct. 14, 2021. Oil was discovered here in 1921, and in the century since, wildcatters have drilled more than a quarter million wells into the layer cake of shale rock under the desert, many more than a mile deep. – AP Photo / David Goldman
A sign warns passing motorists of possible escaping inmates in Midland, Texas, Oct. 11, 2021. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Raylee Bothwell, 8, holds her Minnie Mouse blanket in the wind while watching her first drive-in movie from the back of her family’s pickup truck in Midland, Texas., Oct. 12, 2021. Centered around the boomtowns of Midland and Odessa, the Permian Basin is now the top oil and gas producing region in the U.S., which in turn is the world’s No. 1 producer. – AP Photo / David Goldman
An oil pumpjack operates in the Permian Basin in Stanton, Texas, Oct. 11, 2021. Massive amounts of methane are venting into the atmosphere from oil and gas operations across the Permian Basin, new aerial surveys show. – AP Photo / David Goldman
Washington-based video intern Mike Pesoli edited the images and interviews into an illuminating video, and the presentation by immersive storytelling producer Dario Lopez kept visitors to AP News engaged in the first story of its kind to name names alongside the remarkable visuals.
The story was used by more than 200 customers and more than 150 downloaded the video. The piece also had 123,000 pageviews on AP News and scored near the top for AP reader engagement on the day it ran.
A tiny oil and gas facility in Texas spewed methane into the atmosphere with the same earth-warming power as burning seven tanker trucks of gasoline every day. It was one of 533 so-called “super emitters” found in the biggest U.S. oil field. https://t.co/BJTeI1m3NE
The package had impact too: Less than a week later, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced it was launching an enforcement action and would do the exact analysis AP had just done in order to find methane super emitters in the Permian Basin.
For source building,smart technical reporting,painstaking research and data analysis,innovative photos and video and above all teamwork,Biesecker,Wieffering,Goldman, Pesoli and Lopez are AP’s Best of the Week — First Winners.
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