Reconciling divergent estimates of oil and gas methane emissions

Significance Past studies reporting divergent estimates of methane emissions from the natural gas supply chain have generated conflicting claims about the full greenhouse gas footprint of natural gas. Top-down estimates based on large-scale atmospheric sampling often exceed bottom-up estimates based on source-based emission inventories. In this work, we reconcile top-down and bottom-up methane emissions estimates in one of the country’s major natural gas production basins using easily replicable measurement and data integration techniques. These convergent emissions estimates provide greater confidence that we can accurately characterize the sources of emissions, including the large impact that a small proportion of high-emitters have on total emissions and determine the implications for mitigation.