This should be accounted for in future modeling efforts.” An accurate estimate “As oilfields run low, emissions per unit of oil increase. “Current climate and energy system models typically don’t explore the impacts of oil reservoir depletion in any detail,” said study co-author Adam Brandt, an assistant professor of energy resources engineering at Stanford’s School of Earth, Energy and Environmental Sciences. The new findings, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, have implications for long-term emissions and climate modeling, as well as climate policy.
(Image credit: Adam Brandt)įailing to take the changing energy requirements of oilfields into account can cause oilfield managers or policymakers to underestimate the true climate impacts, Stanford scientists warn. A new software tool developed at Stanford analyzes each phase of the oil production process – from extraction and refinement to transportation – to calculate how much energy is consumed during each step and how much greenhouse gas an oilfield emits. Steam lines from an enhanced oil recovery project in California.
