Beyond wells: Towards demand-side perspective to manage global methane emissions from oil and gas production.

The international trade of oil/gas-implicated commodities could potentially jeopardize global methane mitigation targets when exporting countries have loose or even no methane regulations. Therefore, this paper constructs a demand-driven impacts model to uncover the impact of global consumption and international trade on regional oil and gas methane emissions in 2014. It's estimated that more than three-fifths of global oil & gas methane emissions are embodied in international commodity trade (e.g., petroleum, chemicals), primarily from large oil and gas suppliers (e.g., Russia, Nigeria and Iran) to large consuming economies (e.g., China, Japan and USA). Notably, more than three quarters of oil & gas methane emissions embodied in EU's final consumption occurs in other regions. Our results could facilitate targeted demand-side mitigation strategies (e.g., labeling low-emission products, shifting to a circular bio-economy) to complement supply-side efforts, especially considering the relatively loose supply-side methane regulations on oil and gas sectors in large exporting regions. [Display omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]