Total organic carbon measurements reveal major gaps in petrochemical emissions reporting
- Language of the publication
- English
- Date
- 2024-01-26
- Type
- Accepted manuscript
- Author(s)
- He, Megan
- Ditto, Jenna C.
- Gardner, Lexie
- Machesky, Jo
- Hass-Mitchell, Tori N.
- Chen, Christina
- Khare, Peeyush
- Sahin, Bugra
- Fortner, John D.
- Plata, Desiree L.
- Drollette, Brian D.
- Hayden, Katherine L.
- Wentzell, Jeremy J.B.
- Mittermeier, Richard L.
- Leithead, Amy
- Lee, Patrick
- Darlington, Andrea
- Wren, Sumi N.
- Zhang, Junhua
- Wolde, Mengistu
- Moussa, Samar G.
- Li, Shao-Meng
- Liggio, John
- Gentner, Drew R.
- Publisher
- American Association for the Advancement of Science
Abstract
Anthropogenic organic carbon emissions reporting has been largely limited to subsets of chemically-speciated volatile organic compounds. However, novel aircraft-based measurements revealed total organic carbon emissions exceeding oil sands industry-reported values by 1900-6300%, the bulk of which was due to unaccounted-for intermediate- and semi-volatile organic compounds. Measured facility-wide emissions represented approximately 1% of extracted petroleum, resulting in total organic carbon emissions equivalent to that from all other sources across Canada combined. These real-world observations demonstrate total organic carbon measurements as a means of detecting unknown or underreported carbon emissions regardless of chemical features. Since reporting gaps may include hazardous, reactive, or secondary air pollutants, fully constraining the impact of anthropogenic emissions necessitates routine, comprehensive total gaseous organic carbon monitoring as an inherent check on mass closure.
Description
This is the author’s version of the work. It is posted here by permission of the AAAS for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Science on Volume 383, January 2024, DOI:10.1126/science.adj6233
Subject
- Nature and environment,
- Science and technology
Pagination
16 pages
Peer review
Yes
Open access level
Green
Identifiers
- ISSN
-
1095-9203
- 0036-8075
Article
- Journal title
- Science
- Journal volume
- 383
- Journal issue
- 6681
- Accepted date
- 2023-12-15
- Submitted date
- 2023-07-13
Relation
- Is replaced by:
- https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adj6233