With natural gas projected to play a major role in the global energy mix for decades to come, the incoming Biden Administration would need to mitigate the fuel’s environmental impacts as much as possible in order to fulfill his climate agenda, the most ambitious of any U.S. president in history.

As a result, the industry likely faces more pressure than ever, especially with a Democrat-controlled Senate, to prove gas can be a bridge fuel to a low-carbon economy.

Over the short term, this would require clamping down on methane leakage throughout the gas value chain, and on carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions from combustion of the molecule. Methane, the main component of natural gas, is about 84 times more potent as a greenhouse gas during the first two decades after its release than...