Abandoned Gas Wells from an Optical Gas Imaging (OGI) Angle

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Using Opgal Gas Imaging (OGI) to Monitor Abandoned Gas Wells

Recently, there’s been lots of discussions regarding abandoned oil and gas wells. Before we get into details, let’s first understand what is an abandoned well?

Oil and gas wells are considered defunct natural gas wells once they are no longer used for production purposes. Meaning it has reached the end of its life, and in most cases, no company owns or maintains it. But does that mean it is no longer releasing emissions?

Unfortunately not, in most cases. If the well was not sealed properly at the end of its production life (with cement), it would continue to release methane into the atmosphere. Even if it is no longer producing oil.

For instance, if we take the US state of Pennsylvania, there are thousands of orphan wells from when plugging wells wasn’t required. Leaving many wells emitting methane even today.

Currently, there are no regulations on which method should be used to detect methane emissions and measuring or quantifying the amount of gas emitted from these gas wells. There are High Flow samples, FID, dynamic flux chamber and even good old bag sampling. Many of these methods are highly outdated, unreliable and require measurement very close to the gas wells, making the surveying unsafe and time-consuming.

Let’s get a greater understanding of Optical Gas Imaging (OGI). Using innovative thermal imaging technology and a unique spectral filter method to detect hydrocarbon gas leaks in these wells is proven to be very effective, reliable, quick and safe. You can quickly identify methane emissions from a safe distance, even tiny leaks (EyeCGas 2.0 you can detect 0.35 g/hr). By combining the EyeCGas 2.0 with EyeCSite (QOGI), you can also quantify the leaks either on location or offline.

In the video below, you can see how easily gas leak detection cameras, such as EyeCGas 2.0, using thermal imaging, detects a leaking well close to a home in an inspection in Pennsylvania. Contact us in the form below for to see more example of videos of fugitive emissions and how our high sensitivity infrared cameras were able to detect fugitive emissions of industrial gases.

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