Everybody talks about CBAM this week, and it eclipsed some EU-US tensions on methane MRV for imported gas that I wanted to report as well.
🔥 What just happened
• The EU 2024 methane import rules are now real and the timeline tightens in phases
• Methane leakage now a trade metric: methane intensity = CH4 emitted / UT of gas delivered)
• 2027: Mandatory demonstration of MRV equivalence for new gas supply contracts from 2027 onward (EU-level methane rules or equivalent).
• 2028: Mandatory report of methane intensity of imported crude oil, nat. gas and coal
• 2030: EU methane intensity limit applies for new/renewed contracts (no numeric threshold yet)
➡️ Why Dec 11 was a trigger
• The EU Commission said: OK, we know the big US LNG bottleneck is commingling (= a cargo mixes gas from many fields/ producers, so classic chain of custody MRV breaks)
• BUT we keep the law and make compliance workable: third party certified emission values + digital trace and claim to allocate methane claims even when molecules are mixed is ok
• Bottom line: commingling is not an excuse, it is an “accounting” problem to solve.
Why the US reacted now
• Once “trace and claim” is on the table, argument “this is unworkable” is much weaker
• On Monday (Dec 15), the US asked the EU to delay or exempt US obligations until 2035, calling this a non tariff trade barrier
• Same day, the EU repeated: implementation help OK but no weakening of the regulation
➡️ Who pays?
• No a methane tax. It is a market access standard with penalties
• Producers and exporters pay for monitoring, reporting, verification
• Importers will push costs upstream via contracts: MRV data, certification, audit rights…
🇺🇸 By end-2025, about 50% of EU LNG imports come from the US, making Europe structurally dependent on US gas. Surely, officials will explicitly flag “security of supply” when applying penalties, pushing for pragmatic implementation…
✅ Anyway, this is good news for innovative methane MRV players. Here is a selection of some companies to watch (not comprehensive, of course)
🇨🇦 GHGSAT: dedicated high-resolution satellites that attribute methane emissions to individual facilities, not just regions
🇫🇷 Kayrros: multi-satellite methane intelligence in one platform, strong on analytics and benchmarking across basins and assets
🇳🇱 Orbio Earth (YC S23) Earth: methane intelligence that fuses satellite + ground data, built for buyers and investors needing comparable asset-level signals
🇩🇪 AIRMO: micro LiDAR plus spectroscopy in small satellites to improve precision and source attribution for compliance grade monitoring
🇩🇰 Explicit ApS: Drone Flux Measurement combining gas plus wind to deliver true site level quantification for audit grade MRV
🇺🇸 SeekOps Inc.: drone mounted sensing plus automated workflows for rapid facility LDAR quantification, designed for repeatability
Any other innovative players worth mentioning…
#Methane #MRV #LNG #EnergyPolicy #IndustrialPolicy #Geoeconomics
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