Sensitivity of detection of fugitive methane emissions from coal seam gas fields

Geoscience Australia and CSIRO Marine & Atmospheric Research collected three years of continuous methane and carbon dioxide measurements at the 'Arcturus' monitoring station in the Bowen Basin, Australia. The dataset underpins a simulation study on the sensitivity of atmospheric techniques for detecting fugitive emissions from a simulated new coal seam gas field. Results were presented at the American Geophysical Union meeting in December 2013.

Use Cases

• Simulating detection thresholds for fugitive methane emissions based on a three-year atmospheric baseline.
• Evaluating the performance of atmospheric monitoring stations for verifying emission reductions in gas fields.
• Statistical analysis of perturbed vs. baseline methane signals to test for the presence of fugitive emissions.
• Modeling the likelihood of detection and false alarm rates for various emission levels and distances from a monitoring station.

Strengths

• Data is based on three years of continuous atmospheric measurements.
• Simulations cover a range of fugitive emission rates from less than 1% to up to 10% of production.
• Analysis includes statistical comparisons and a developed time series model for the methane baseline.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data may reflect geographic bias inherent to the single monitoring station in the Bowen Basin.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia and CSIRO Marine & Atmospheric Research, via the Australian Ocean Data Network.

Collection Method

Continuous atmospheric measurements collected at the 'Arcturus' monitoring station, supplemented by simulations using the TAPM meteorological and air pollution model.

Time Range

Three years of baseline measurements, with simulations for a 1-year period.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-05 05:51:11.042640; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Bowen Basin, Australia, with simulated emissions from 10-50 km from the monitoring station.