Climate Change, Development & Aid, Economy & Trade, Editors’ Choice, Energy, Environment, Featured, Headlines, Integration and Development Brazilian-style, Projects, Trade & Investment MEXICO CITY, Jul 8 2017 (IPS) – Mexico is in transition towards commercial exploitation of its shale gas, which is being included in two auctions of 24 hydrocarbon blocks, at a time when the country is having difficulty preventing and reducing industrial methane emissions.
Increasing atmospheric release of methane, which is far more polluting than carbon dioxide (CO2) and which is emitted along the entire chain of production, is threatening the climate goals adopted by Mexico within the Paris Agreement which aims to contain global warming.
In March, the national Agency for Industrial Safety and Environmental Protection, responsible for regulating the hydrocarbons sector, published a regulatory package on exploitation and extraction of non-conventional reserves.
Gas emissions Within this context, Mexico faces problems in reducing methane emissions.
Use of gas for electricity generation contributed at least 0.52 million tonnes.
Mexico, Latin America’s second largest economy, emitted a total of 608 million tonnes of CO2 during the same year.
Pemex Exploration and Production, a subsidiary of the state PEMEX group, reported that in 2016 its total methane emissions were 641,517 tonnes, 38 percent higher than the previous year.
increased by 329 percent, leaping from 141,622 tonnes to 465,956 tonnes, presumably because of increased venting and burning of gas (whether or not associated with crude oil wells).
By reducing venting and burning, PEMEX was able to reduce its emissions between 2009 and 2011, after GHG emissions grew from 2007 to 2009.
Meanwhile, it extracted 2.31 million barrels of crude per day.