With regard to air emissions, the advantages of deepwater Gulf of Mexico production are rather obvious:
- High production rates per well
- Few surface facilities (57 deepwater platforms, 3% of GoM total, produce 90+% of oil)
- Modern gas turbines for power generation
- Tightly enforced restrictions on flaring and venting
- Better control of fugitive emissions
- Distant from shore (not a factor for GHG effects)
Wood Mackenzie, NOIA, and others contend that restrictions on GoM leasing are contrary to carbon reduction goals.
An important and unintended consequence of enacting more restrictive policies such as a lease ban or increase in royalty rate in the Gulf of Mexico is that it could give rise to carbon leakage to countries that export crude to US.
Wood Mackenzie
In light of the policy implications of GHG emissions, a Carbon Intensity Workshop is highly recommended. The estimates generated by Wood Mackenzie, Rystad, and others need to be explored in depth. Is data quality an issue? How are the data verified? Is there regulator or third party oversight? What are the assumptions behind the estimates? Also, for the purposes of US policy decisions, product transportation emissions should certainly be included. A barrel produced in the Middle East is not the same as a barrel produced in the GoM.
Looking at the chart above, I have immediate questions about the drilling emissions (blue). What wells are included? What about workovers and other well operations? I’m surprised that the deepwater GoM drilling emissions are so high relative to the other regions. While dynamically positioned MODUs have high fuel consumption rates, deepwater wells are few in number relative to shale drilling. Also, why are Brazil’s drilling emissions, which I assume are primarily associated with deepwater operations, so much lower that those for the GoM.
BOEM/BSEE and/or the Gulf Research Program (NASEM) would seem to be good sponsors for such a workshop.
Bud's Offshore Energy (BOE) 