Julian Popov, minister of environment of Bulgaria, is an expert on low carbon economy and energy security in South East Europe. He is ECF Fellow, Chairman BPIE, Energy Security Adviser to the Bulgarian President. Founding Vice Chancellor of the New Bulgarian University, Founding Board Member of the Institute of Sustainable Transition and Development, Former Chairman of the Bulgarian School of Politics.

We talked gas dependency and Ukraine war.

Raul Cazan

Andris Piebalgs is former European Commissioner for Energy (Barroso I) and for Development (Barroso II), currently with the prestigious Florence School of Regulation (European University Institute) in Fiesole, Italy.

For what we were interested in this dialogue, it was noteworthy that Piebalgs was the Chair of the International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO) Implementation Committee. We talked international politics of methane and the energy facet of the war in Ukraine.

Raul Cazan

Ilaria Conti is Head of Gas at the Florence School of Regulation.

Her main fields of expertise concern EU institutional relations and EU electricity and gas regulation.

She spent about 9 years in Brussels, working for the the Permanent Representation of Italy at the EU, the United Nations and, from 2005 until 2013, for EFET, the “European Federation of Energy Traders” covering various positions within the association.

Professor Conti joined the Florence School of Regulation (FSR) in 2015 as Energy Policy Deputy and in 2017 she was appointed Head of the new FSR Gas area.

She is author and co-author of many scientific articles and position papers, actually, until 8 years ago she was the Managing Editor of the publication “Economics of Energy & Environmental Policy” that belongs to the International Association for Energy Economics.

We met in 2022 in qualities of master and disciple (I was the student, obviously) at the European University Institute in Florence – in the beautiful little town of Fiesole up on the hills west of Florence - where you, professor, were part of the teaching staff in a course that dealt with high quality regulation in areas such as climate and energy.

Raul Cazan

So if methane is this big a problem, what tools do we have, and are we using, to solve it? The first global agreement that methane was a problem came in the form of the Global Methane Pledge announced at COP26 at Glasgow in 2021. What’s happened since then, especially in the industry with the easiest to abate emissions: oil and gas?

We look at the International Methane Emissions Observatory, the Oil and Gas Methane Partnership, the new EU regulation on methane and proposals for financial instruments to help bring emissions down.

Host:

The show is presented by: Francesca Fazey

Affiliation:

The show is brought to you by: The 2Celsius Association

Resource List:

1. Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)

2. International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO)

3. International Energy Agency (IEA)

4. Global Methane Tracker

5. United Nations Global Methane Pledge

6. Rocky Mountain Institute Climate Program

7. Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

8. Clean Air Task Force

9. Greenhouse Gas Laboratory, University of Royal Holloway

10. Romanian Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas

Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences, Paris

11. University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, USA

12. NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre, Washington DC, USA

Contributors:

Raul Cazan, Founder of The 2Celsius Association, Bucharest, Romania

Kim O’Dowd, Campaigner at The Environmental Investigation Agency, London, UK

Dr Roland Kupers, Global Advisor to the United Nations Environment Programme’s International Methane Emissions Observatory, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Deborah Gordon, Senior Fellow, Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University; Senior Principal at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) Climate Program, Washington DC, USA

Dr Philippe Ciais, Associate Director, Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL), Paris, France

Théophile Humann-Guilleminot, Campaign Manager, Clean Air Task Force ,Athens Greece

Dr Dave Lowry, Reader: Stable Isotope and Greenhouse Gas, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Rebecca Fisher: Reader: Atmospheric Methane, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Thoman Roeckmann, Professor of Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Professor Jonathan Stern, Distinguished Research Fellow, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Oxford, UK

Melanie Kenderdine, Principal, Energy Futures Initiative, Washington DC, USA

Natural gas is the ideal bridge fuel to support the global energy transition, or so the story goes. But what about methane emissions? Environmentalists want us to throw it on the pile of the other fossil fuels and doom it to the past. The energy community says: Not so fast. Where are we on our energy transition journey when it comes to natural gas and if we’re going to invest in it going forward, what are the implications of the methane problem for our chosen direction to a renewable future?

Host:

The show is presented by: Francesca Fazey

Affiliation:

The show is brought to you by: 2Celsius Association

Resource List:

1. Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)

2. International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO)

3. International Energy Agency (IEA)

4. Global Methane Tracker

5. United Nations Global Methane Pledge

6. Rocky Mountain Institute Climate Program

7. Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

8. Clean Air Task Force

9. Greenhouse Gas Laboratory, University of Royal Holloway

10. Romanian Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas

Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences, Paris

11. University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, USA

12. NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre, Washington DC, USA

Contributors:

Raul Cazan, Founder of The 2Celsius Association, Bucharest, Romania

Kim O’Dowd, Campaigner at The Environmental Investigation Agency, London, UK

Dr Roland Kupers, Global Advisor to the United Nations Environment Programme’s International Methane Emissions Observatory, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Deborah Gordon, Senior Fellow, Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University; Senior Principal at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) Climate Program, Washington DC, USA

Dr Philippe Ciais, Associate Director, Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL), Paris, France

Théophile Humann-Guilleminot, Campaign Manager, Clean Air Task Force ,Athens Greece

Dr Dave Lowry, Reader: Stable Isotope and Greenhouse Gas, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Rebecca Fisher: Reader: Atmospheric Methane, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Thoman Roeckmann, Professor of Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Professor Jonathan Stern, Distinguished Research Fellow, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Oxford, UK

Melanie Kenderdine, Principal, Energy Futures Initiative, Washington DC, USA

Host:

The show is presented by: Francesca Fazey

Affiliation:

The show is brought to you by: 2Celsius Association

Resource List:

1. Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)

2. International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO)

3. International Energy Agency (IEA)

4. Global Methane Tracker

5. United Nations Global Methane Pledge

6. Rocky Mountain Institute Climate Program

7. Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

8. Clean Air Task Force

9. Greenhouse Gas Laboratory, University of Royal Holloway

10. Romanian Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas

Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences, Paris

11. University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, USA

12. NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre, Washington DC, USA

Contributors:

Raul Cazan, Founder of The 2Celsius Association, Bucharest, Romania

Kim O’Dowd, Campaigner at The Environmental Investigation Agency, London, UK

Dr Roland Kupers, Global Advisor to the United Nations Environment Programme’s International Methane Emissions Observatory, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Deborah Gordon, Senior Fellow, Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University; Senior Principal at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) Climate Program, Washington DC, USA

Dr Philippe Ciais, Associate Director, Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL), Paris, France

Théophile Humann-Guilleminot, Campaign Manager, Clean Air Task Force ,Athens Greece

Dr Dave Lowry, Reader: Stable Isotope and Greenhouse Gas, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Rebecca Fisher: Reader: Atmospheric Methane, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Thoman Roeckmann, Professor of Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Professor Jonathan Stern, Distinguished Research Fellow, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Oxford, UK

Melanie Kenderdine, Principal, Energy Futures Initiative, Washington DC, USA

In this episode, we introduce our listeners to some of the world’s methane hunters, environmental detectives who use cutting-edge technology to detect and quantify methane emissions, making an invisible gas, visible. We embark on a methane hunting expedition of our own and talk to the coordinator of one of the world’s largest methane studies on the difference between estimated and measured emissions in the oil and gas sector.

Host:

The show is presented by: Francesca Fazey

Affiliation:

The show is brought to you by: 2Celsius Association

Resource List:

1. Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)

2. International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO)

3. International Energy Agency (IEA)

4. Global Methane Tracker

5. United Nations Global Methane Pledge

6. Rocky Mountain Institute Climate Program

7. Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

8. Clean Air Task Force

9. Greenhouse Gas Laboratory, University of Royal Holloway

10. Romanian Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas

Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences, Paris

11. University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, USA

12. NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre, Washington DC, USA

Contributors:

Raul Cazan, Founder of The 2Celsius Association, Bucharest, Romania

Kim O’Dowd, Campaigner at The Environmental Investigation Agency, London, UK

Dr Roland Kupers, Global Advisor to the United Nations Environment Programme’s International Methane Emissions Observatory, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Deborah Gordon, Senior Fellow, Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University; Senior Principal at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) Climate Program, Washington DC, USA

Dr Philippe Ciais, Associate Director, Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL), Paris, France

Théophile Humann-Guilleminot, Campaign Manager, Clean Air Task Force ,Athens Greece

Dr Dave Lowry, Reader: Stable Isotope and Greenhouse Gas, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Rebecca Fisher: Reader: Atmospheric Methane, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Thoman Roeckmann, Professor of Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Professor Jonathan Stern, Distinguished Research Fellow, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Oxford, UK

Melanie Kenderdine, Principal, Energy Futures Initiative, Washington DC, USA

In this second episode of our podcast, we delve into the complex world of methane emission sources. Join us as we look at the five main sectors that emit methane, unpack how the main ingredient of natural gas is also emitted by cow burps and get a taste of how scientists tease apart the difference. We’ll also touch on why so much emphasis is placed on the emissions from oil and gas.

Host:

The show is presented by: Francesca Fazey

Affiliation:

The show is brought to you by: 2Celsius Association

Resource List:

1. Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)

2. International Methane Emissions Observatory (IMEO)

3. International Energy Agency (IEA)

4. Global Methane Tracker

5. United Nations Global Methane Pledge

6. Rocky Mountain Institute Climate Program

7. Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

8. Clean Air Task Force

9. Greenhouse Gas Laboratory, University of Royal Holloway

10. Romanian Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas

Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences, Paris

11. University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, USA

12. NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre, Washington DC, USA

Contributors:

Raul Cazan, Founder of The 2Celsius Association, Bucharest, Romania

Kim O’Dowd, Campaigner at The Environmental Investigation Agency, London, UK

Dr Roland Kupers, Global Advisor to the United Nations Environment Programme’s International Methane Emissions Observatory, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Deborah Gordon, Senior Fellow, Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University; Senior Principal at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) Climate Program, Washington DC, USA

Dr Philippe Ciais, Associate Director, Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL), Paris, France

Théophile Humann-Guilleminot, Campaign Manager, Clean Air Task Force ,Athens Greece

Dr Dave Lowry, Reader: Stable Isotope and Greenhouse Gas, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Rebecca Fisher: Reader: Atmospheric Methane, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Royal Holloway, London UK

Dr Thoman Roeckmann, Professor of Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Professor Jonathan Stern, Distinguished Research Fellow, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Oxford, UK

Melanie Kenderdine, Principal, Energy Futures Initiative, Washington DC, USA