Aerial methane measurements taken during August in the Permian Basin indicate the oil and gas industry continues to have issues in controlling flaring and venting, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) said Thursday.

Permian production

The EDF’s ongoing Permian Methane Analysis Project, aka PermianMAP, is collecting methane emissions from the air, via towers and on the ground across a 10,000 square-kilometer grid, or a grid of around 6,200 square miles, that spans the Delaware sub-basin. 

“The new data was collected during an 11-day period in August,” according to EDF. “The aircraft detected over 900 plumes of methane from more than 500 sources. As with previous surveys of the area, this new data again confirms that super-emitting sites continue to be a problem across the Permian.”

The...