Methane Emissions Falling Due To Private Efforts

See WSJ editorial Meth Heads in the White House: Obama plans to regulate methane even as emissions plummet. Excerpts:

"Overall emissions fell 4.7% between 1990 and 2008 and 6.3% between 2008 and 2012,"

"Natural gas is the source of less than a third of the total, the next largest being “enteric fermentation,” or livestock flatulence. Those, er, emissions rose 2.3% over 1990-2012."

"Methane reduction in the drilling industry has been dramatic. Methane emissions from natural gas systems fell 14.3% from 2008-12. Since 2011 the EPA has also specifically measured methane leaks from hydraulically fractured natural gas wells. By 2013 those dove 73%, more than did any other industrial source."

"These are the same years when the U.S. became the world’s natural-gas leader, with production increasing by nearly fourfold since 2008."

"Methane emissions nonetheless fell."

"the leakage rate as measured in the field was not only lower than the EPA’s assumptions but had also fallen 10% year over year."

"What explains these remarkable advances?"

"natural gas is primarily composed of methane itself, and leakages mean drillers and transporters are losing the valuable commodity they are trying to sell. The economic incentive to capture CH4 has translated into rapid technological progress,"