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Louis Mann is a Research and Development Manager for Atlas Copco Gas and Process, and he is responsible for new turboexpander product and feature development. Mr. Mann received a BS in mechanical engineering from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo and is a registered Professional Engineer in the State of California.


louis mann.jpg

Expander-compressor units provide refrigeration for extracting heavier hydrocarbon components while having low energy costs. 

Turboexpander reliability has increased steadily over time 

Hanwha Power Systems launched a new compressor portfolio: the SM100 Pro Series, which includes models SM3100, SM4100, SM5100, SM6100, and SM7100. The upgraded series improves corrosion and rust resistance, thermal efficiency, and scale blockage, and optimizes aerodynamics.

“The newly released SM100 Pro series is focused on improving efficiency, which is beneficial for the efficiency-critical air separation unit industry,” said Kihun Do, Vice President & General Manager, Equipment Business Division, Hanwha Power Systems. “Our turbo compressors apply to all industrial fields but are widely used in electronic manufacturing, such as semiconductors, batteries, home appliances, food, textile, glass, automobile, and tire manufacturing. Because of its advanced efficiency, it is an eco-friendly product that contributes to reducing carbon emissions. It is also 100% compatible with existing Hanwha Power Systems SM100 series so that it can replace aging equipment.”

The cooler-tube materials are upgraded with stainless steel 304, which is resistant to rust and corrosion. They increase thermal efficiency by securing more than 10% of the heat area. The tube’s scale-blockage phenomenon was also minimized by over 20% within the inner diameter’s cross-sectional area.

Compared to the previous compressors, the enhanced aerodynamic components increase efficiency and flow range by approximately 1 - 3% and 1.5 - 4%, respectively. The higher specific power (efficiency) rates vary by model, but all feature improved corrosion resistance and heat-exchanger efficiency in the superior turbine strike tube.

Its SM100 Pro Series fulfills various customer requirements, such as:

Supplying zinc-alloy-free solutions for secondary battery types

Meeting the required discharge temperature conditions set by customers

Approved to produce certified products for specific countries

Operation for air separation unit customers

The company integrated long-term reliability, technology, and gas turbine experience data from its database, further improving the SM100 Pro Series’ equipment efficiency rate.

“Through the database’s accumulated analysis of the delivered/operated compressors, we have optimized the aerodynamic components, including the impeller and diffuser, to achieve improved equipment efficiency with high reliability,” Kihun said.

Each turbocompressor manufacturer is currently focused on quality products, solutions tailored to each customer application, and installing “green” technology to fulfill international environmental requirements. Hanwha Power Systems is building a U.S.-based packaging and manufacturing facility by 2025, with first production in early 2026 to meet these market standards.

“The compressor market is heavily influenced by recent international circumstances, such as the Russia-Ukraine War and U.S. tariffs, which significantly impact Hanwha Power Systems' many policies and decisions,” said Daekyung Kim, Team Leader, Standard Compressor Sales Team, Equipment Business Division, Hanwha Power Systems. "We also operate various overseas aftermarket service centers to maintain and manage the compressors’ lifetime quality. Furthermore, we strive to secure stable international supply chains by diversifying raw and subsidiary material partners.”

 signed a memorandum of understanding to develop a supercritical CO

) waste heat recovery project to leverage the heat stream at a natural gas pipeline compressor station. An unspecified gas turbine OEM will also participate by verifying a combined power generation solution, integrating gas turbines with Hanwha’s sCO

 power generation system at a compressor station owned and operated by TC Energy in West Virginia. The system will offer a lower cost and carbon-free renewable generation solution, recovering unutilized waste-heat exhaust from a gas turbine compressor. According to Hanwha, the installation will reduce the carbon intensity of natural gas pipeline operations while producing clean, emissions-free electricity.

The new compressor line features improved corrosion resistance, thermal efficiency, and reduced tube blockage.

Hanwha Power Systems Launches Low-CO2 Compressor Line: SM100 Pro Series

 annual Western Turbine Users Inc. (WTUI), held March 30 – April 2, 2025, in sunny Long Beach, California, welcomed a record number of attendees: more than 1,100. Just over 600 were exhibitors, including 146 companies exhibiting in the exhibit hall.

Attendees had access to authorized service providers for LM turbines, including IHI Power Services Corp., TransCanada Turbines, and MTU Aero Engines, as well as other independent service providers, to help solve turbine and plant issues. Breakout sessions for GE LM2500, LM5000, LM6000, and LMS100 allowed users to present their operational challenges and have fellow LM users offer solutions and troubleshooting techniques.

“WTUI’s forums are very active and getting more so,” said Ed Jackson, President of WTUI and Exira Station Manager at Missouri River Energy Services in Brayton, Iowa. “With the challenging environment of acquiring timely parts and service lately, compounded by reaching maintenance intervals faster due to increased operation, it is more important than ever for users to lean on and support each other. I believe that is becoming apparent in the active user forums and increased communication between users.”

Monamee Adhikari, Global Marketing Leader for Aeroderivatives at GE Vernova, said the top challenges for users at WTUI were “around supply-chain constraints related to parts and turnaround times from our depots. There is a global supply-chain constraint; however, we are doing our best to overcome this and be transparent with our customers. Our main focus is SQDC: safety, quality, delivery, and cost.”

GE Vernova’s focus is on SQDC and its L5, L4, and L2 service shops to ensure they get units back to customers in a timely manner and communicate accordingly to set expectations.

Monday morning, Mark Axford, Founder of Axford Turbine Consultants, and Tony Brough, President of Dora Partners & Co., presented the 

19th annual State of the Gas Turbine World

The demand from AI data centers has caused unit sales to surge. “Reported gas turbine orders were up 32% in 2024, with GE Vernova as the market share leader,” Axford said. 2024 marked the highest unit number and MWs (near 500 units and almost 60 MW) reported since 2002.

In addition, Axford estimated an additional 30,000 MW of unreported orders, known as reservation agreements, bringing the total order book for 2024 to a level exceeding 80,000 MW.

U.S. utilities and developers “are racing to install baseload gas turbine combined-cycle power, but they can’t get it fast enough,” Axford said. GE Vernova, Siemens Energy, and Mitsubishi are now scheduled to deliver their large gas turbines in 2028 - 2029. In fact, he said that large gas turbine supply is essentially sold out for the next three to four years.

“Increasing power demand due to data centers and AI is definitely on everyone’s minds,” Adhikari said. “Almost all OEMs are supply-challenged from a gas-turbine perspective, and GE Vernova aims to reduce lead times in conjunction with GE Aerospace. With decarbonization being less of a focus for the new Administration, GE Vernova will still do what’s right environmentally. We are focusing on both pre- and post-combustion carbon reduction and are ready with solutions for our customers whenever they are ready.”

Jackson said energy providers are scrambling to add generation to meet the need. “Not only is the lead time for major equipment increasing, but even the time it takes to build plants could take years to permit and build,” he said. “This puts a lot of pressure on the existing generation, as many peaking plants that were originally designed to run at capacity factors of 10% or less are now running 30%, 40%, 50%, or more. We are pushing those plants harder and hitting the major maintenance intervals faster, which is putting even more pressure on an already burdened supply chain. Operators have to revise how they used to plan and budget and work with suppliers to ensure the availability of parts and labor. Running these plants is getting more challenging, making it even more important for users to attend conferences and forums like WTUI to ‘compare notes.’”

President Donald Trump’s election has ushered in profound changes to the U.S. energy policy. Axford said the President’s goal is “energy dominance” with less government intervention—“Drill baby Drill” is the new Administration’s anthem driving energy forward. The United States exited the Paris Agreement, and it’s uncertain whether EPA regulations on CO

will be altered. Green subsidies and EV mandates are out. Instead, the new U.S. Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, showed strong support at CERAWeek 2025 for pipelines, drilling, fracking, LNG, and gas turbines.

It’s uncertain how the Administration’s tariffs will impact the supply chain. “Generally speaking, with the tariffs today, it’s early to kind of understand what the full financial implications are for [GE Vernova],” Adhikari said. "It’s not nothing, but it’s something that we’ll manage our way through, and I think it’s something we’re going to have to get smarter on every day, on how we manage through the volatility that we’re going to have with the topic of tariffs. Our team’s working on it every day, and I’m confident we’ll navigate our way through it.”

As gas turbine orders surge, the energy transition is being reworked into energy addition. The energy trilemma—reliable, affordable, sustainable—in which each side of the triangle was equal, is shifting its priorities to affordability holding the lion’s share, reliability as the second runner-up, and a small focus on sustainability, according to Axford.

There is no path to net zero by 2050. “It would cost 5% of the world’s GDP for the next 25 years, and we are further away now than we were in 2022,” Daniel Yergin, Vice Charman of S&P Global, said at CERAWeek by S&P Global 2025.

The practical approach is affordable LNG for heating and cooking. In 2024, the United States was the no. 1 LNG exporter. The U.S. Energy Information Administration projects U.S. LNG exports will increase by 80% by December 2028.

Cheniere is the largest U.S. exporter of LNG, and it is “ramping up its exports,” according to Axford. In 2026, exports are slated to reach 55 million metric tons, up 22% compared to 2024. What’s powering Cheniere’s exports? GE’s LM2500 gas turbines.

Gas turbines [have] gone wild, as Axford put it. New orders are now shipping in 2027, 2028, and 2029, with gas turbine and engineering, procurement, and construction prices up sharply. According to Dora Partners & Co., global gas turbine MW orders were upwards of 40,000 in 2023 and around 60,000 MW in 2024, with reservations for more than 80,000 MW.

“We completed a modern combined cycle in 2022 for $785 per KW,” said John W. Ketchum, CEO of NextEra. “A new build for 2030 commercial operation will cost $2,400 per KW.”

GE Vernova saw solid numbers in 2024. It regained the no. 1 market share spot of advanced-frame gas turbines—Mitsubishi was no. 1 in 2022 – 2023—and has approximately 85% market share for aeroderivative gas turbines. The company booked 22 GW of gas turbine “orders” in 2024. It is expanding its Greenville, South Carolina, gas turbine factory capacity from 55 heavy-frame gas turbines per year (now) to 70 – 80 per year in 2026.

Overall, advanced-frame (> 225 MW) gas turbine orders were approximately 80% of all gas turbine orders (MWe). The top OEMs and their gas turbine models include:

Axford said 2024 was a strong year for LM6000 and LM2500+G4 and predicts 2025 gas turbine “orders” will increase by 7 – 10%.

"WTUI’s forums are very active and getting more so. With the challenging environment of acquiring timely parts and service lately, compounded by reaching maintenance intervals faster due to increased operation, it is more important than ever for users to lean on and support each other.” - Ed Jackson, President of WTUI

During the technical sessions, Jack Odlum, the Northwest Regional Manager at HRST Inc., outlined how operating and design modifications improve a 

 (HRSG) efficiency. His session focused on efficiency from two perspectives: operational efficiency or to ensure the HRSG is running reliably in an ever-changing market and thermal efficiency from the classic heat-rate point of view.

Odlum said it’s surprising how even small changes impact HRSG efficiency: “Things like baffle gaps or tube fouling might seem like no big deal, but as they add up, it can mean lost MWs of production in larger HRSGs. Not every efficiency-boosting modification needs to be something like adding an economizer surface or installing an upgraded duct burner. Sometimes, it’s as simple as keeping the HRSG in close to as-built conditions as possible. When it comes to operational efficiency, it’s more directed at running the plant well in an evolving power market, ensuring you can get online fast enough with as little damage to the boiler as possible.”

Odlum said he’s seeing two trends: cycling in HRSG operation and design and challenges with the size of newer turbines, like the H-class machines.

Engineering Manager Matt Gentry of Airflow Sciences Corp. presented on 

 for aero power plant performance optimization and addressed how it can identify, solve, and optimize parameters such as flow, temperature, ammonia, NOx, and pressure drop.

“Flow modeling is an important component of the engineering toolbox,” Gentry said. “Both computational fluid dynamics and physical-scale modeling can provide detailed predictions of flow, pressure, ammonia, and temperature distributions throughout a gas turbine power plant. These predictions allow for performance optimization without the need for a time-consuming and expensive trial-and-error approach to solving problems in the field.”

Gentry said many flow-related parameters are inter-related:

Ammonia non-uniformity can cause pressure loss and heat-rate issues

Poor velocity distribution can result in skewed heat transfer at tube banks

Tube bank, catalyst, and ammonia injection grid seals/baffles may seem simple, but if they are not maintained, they can have a significant negative impact

WTUI 2026 will be back in Long Beach, California, from Tuesday, April 7 to Friday, April 10, 2026.

Supply and faster maintenance intervals are impacting the aeroderivative gas turbine market as OEMs try to keep up with demand.

Conference Coverage

WTUI 2025 Supports Gas Turbines Users as Maintenance Intervals, Power Demand Increase

Around 1971, at the urging of Charlie Jackson, a notable oil and gas engineer in Houston, Prof. Meherwan Boyce of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Texas A&M established the Gas Turbine Laboratories, now known as the Turbomachinery Lab. 

Around the same time, a group of Texas A&M (TAMU) engineering graduates organized the first Turbomachinery Symposium as a concerted effort to assist Gulf Coast downstream operators with equipment challenges. 

Today, the Turbo Lab is a 37,000-square-foot facility equipped with 12 vibration-damped test cells and numerous air compressors to drive test rigs. Despite the lab’s leading sophistication, the experienced faculty largely place operations in the hands of the future: TAMU students.

Turbomachinery International toured the Turbo Lab in February with Greg Gammon, Director of Global and Corporate Partnerships, and Dr. Adolfo Delgado, Associate Professor, leading the charge. The duo offered an in-depth history of TAMU itself, the Turbomachinery & Pump Symposium (TPS), and the Turbo Lab’s efforts to advance research for rotating machinery

Despite the Turbo Lab’s sprawling nature, some of it was inaccessible due to construction for an upcoming facility: the Propulsion Energetics Research Laboratory (PERL), designed with open and closed configurations for propulsion and gas turbine applications, as well as dynamic events such as detonations and explosions. Still, Dr. Delgado guided the tour through the main high-bay location and offered insight on its layout, purpose, and how it’s used in the modern day.

“When this building was designed, they created this space with the idea that equipment would be brought in via 18-wheeler, you lay it next to a test cell and work on it, and then roll it in for testing,” Delgado said. “We have 12 test cells, and each has two rooms. One is a control room with equipment for data acquisition and equipment control, while the other is an isolated test area. The test cell is separated by a wall that’s fire-, shock-, and sound-proof.” 

Each test area contains a six-foot-deep concrete slab that’s isolated from the building’s foundation, preventing the transfer of test-induced vibration to its critical infrastructure. The facility’s top level is mainly comprised of additional offices, which, according to Delgado, host computational work, materials testing equipment, an additive manufacturing facility, and a library.

Within many of these cells, TAMU students are currently conducting rotordynamics testing. “One of the common themes at the Turbo Lab, specifically for rotordynamics, is component-level testing,” Delgado said. “This example is a tilting pad bearing controlled-motion test rig, in which we isolate the bearing and characterize its dynamic forced performance. We test a bearing at rotor surface speeds comparable to or the same as ones you would see on a high-speed compressor, for example. This is an element from a compressor OEM that we’ve been testing.”

He emphasized that, after adequate laboratory certification, students operate all test cells, as the Turbo Lab prides itself on “training professionals.” The test rig vibrates the floating bearing with an electrohydraulic shaker capable of transferring dynamic loads while the static loader simulates the machine’s weight under a real-life operating scenario. Delgado said that most testing, which is sponsored by industry participants, aims to validate models or new concepts for OEMs and end users. In terms of component-level testing, the Lab also evaluates annular clearance seals performance.

“In this cell, we test high-pressure oil and gas seals,” Delgado said. “We’re currently testing labyrinth or textured seals designed to stabilize machines like high-speed compressors. We’ve also been working with 3D-printed seals for prototyping and testing different surface texture concepts. Isolating component performance is a necessary part of component-level testing, as it would be more difficult to assess performance within the full-scale machine itself.” 

Given that students are testing machinery and components under real-world conditions, safety is a top priority among faculty. A safety officer enforces a strict protocol, which includes safety training at the university, lab, and test-cell levels. The training is comprised of online and in-person aspects, the latter of which includes education on energy sources and how to manage emergencies, such as oil spills.

The Lab also contains a full-scale machine shop for manufacturing smaller components or modifying existing components. A facility manager leads the shop, but students may use the tools if they’ve received proper training. 

The last test cell was conducting combustion-related research with shock tubes, and Dr. Delgado handed off the tour to Dr. Claire Grégoire, a post-doctoral researcher at TAMU. “It’s a long piece of tubing split into two sections separated by a diaphragm,” Grégoire said. “We study the gas phase of a mixture that can be fuel-air or electrolytes in a lithium-ion battery. We fill one side with pressure so the diaphragm breaks and sends a shockwave, igniting the mixture on the other side. Optical or laser elements monitor the combustion properties.” 

Two other students were assessing oil combustion properties with the same shock-tube technology, deploying the aforementioned laser absorption spectroscopy to measure the concentration of specific chemical species precisely. This allows researchers to study combustion kinetics at high temperatures and pressures by tracking the formation and decay of key reactions.

The Turbo Lab is part of the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station (TEES) and focuses on three key areas: research, education, and workforce development. The main facility is located in College Station, Texas, and primarily studies rotordynamics and mechanical systems, thermal fluids and combustion, and computational modeling and design. 

Dr. Eric Petersen, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Director of Texas A&M’s Turbo Lab, said new research covers power generation gas turbines, rocket propulsion systems, explosion and detonation safety limits, aviation jet propulsion, and hypersonic propulsion systems. “In recent years, we have also been developing methods for studying coke formation and possible ignition in lubrication oils when exposed to elevated temperatures.”

Gammon stressed that the Turbo Lab’s role and history are interlinked with the TPS conference: “The symposia did not originate from Texas A&M. Instead, it originated from an industry that was looking to solve problems. In the late 1960s and early 70s, a group of machinery engineers in the Gulf Coast region faced massive machinery failures in ethylene plants, primarily due to the uptick in plastic demand. These engineers came together, and, luckily, some were Texas A&M graduates.” 

Gammon said that both TPS and Asia TPS are the Turbo Lab’s biggest assets, with industry-leading individuals and companies volunteering for a spot on the advisory committee. Speaking on his own role, Gammon put it simply: facilitating knowledge transfer.

“We have very smart people in many different places,” Gammon said. “We have smart people doing research at the laboratory, including students and professors; we have smart people on our advisory committees; and we have smart people teaching short courses outside of TPS and presenting at the symposia. Everything I do facilitates that.” 

Perhaps the biggest upcoming development for the Turbo Lab is the Industry Certification Program that will help educate rotating equipment engineers across a variety of industries, such as oil and gas, petroleum, power production, and additional industrial applications. Being certified under this program will demonstrate a practical knowledge base to employers in the field, potentially bridging the skill/experience gap brought on by the exodus of older professionals and the influx of younger, inexperienced engineers.

By combining face-to-face courses, rigorous testing, and continued education to maintain competency, engineers can be certified by top subject matter experts in numerous fields, including but not limited to:

“Major companies can use these certifications to judge placement,” Gammon said. “It also helps standardize development and competence, like API develops a standard of education for rotating equipment engineers. This program is designed for working engineers, not field technicians. The curriculum will be developed by industry instructors and includes testing, which we don't do in any of our current courses.”

The Turbo Lab maintains its student-first focus throughout all the research operations, educational initiatives, and industry-oriented conferences. “Students are our primary product and everything that we do,” Gammon said. “Even in the symposia, we bring our students. We are educating at the lab, and we want to engage them with continuous education programs.” 

Dr. Delgado said, quoting the late professor and Turbo Lab director, Dr. Dara Childs, they are in the business of training professionals, “everything else is secondary to that, including the research that we do. That’s reflected in the lab, as everything you see is done by students since we don’t rely on technicians.” 

Although the Turbo Lab has been conducting world-class research on rotating machinery for decades, it does not lose sight of its educational roots, allowing students to obtain hands-on knowledge before entering the workforce. With the knowledge gap growing between older or retiring professionals and newer engineers, Texas A&M’s Turbo Lab ensures that the new generation will be equipped to handle the current and future energy challenges and opportunities.

Check out our video and written interviews with 

The Turbomachinery Laboratory at Texas A&M researches compressors, turbines, and pumps, fostering collaboration between academia and industry.

Featured

Turbo Tour: Texas A&M’s Turbo Lab: Student-First Research with Industry-Wide Goals

Methane, the main component of natural gas, is on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) hit list, calling it a climate “super pollutant.” Methane has a shorter lifetime in the atmosphere than CO

 but a greater near-term warming potential. According to the EPA, methane is responsible for approximately one-third of the current warming resulting from human activities and is a greenhouse gas (GHG) with a global warming factor 28 times higher than CO

The Agency released its final rule in late 2023 that will sharply cut methane and other GHG emissions from oil and gas operations—the nation’s largest industrial source of methane. The ruling includes revisions to the new source performance standards and emissions guidelines and promotes the use of methane-detection technologies.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) says methane abatement in the oil and gas industry is one of the cheapest options to reduce GHG emissions anywhere in the economy, and the industry has the largest potential for abatement in the near term. The energy sector accounts for nearly 40% of total methane emissions from human activity; oil and gas operations are responsible for 80 million tons of methane emissions.

The solutions and technologies outlined by the EPA will prevent an estimated 58 million tons of methane emissions from 2024 - 2038. The EPA said the rule would achieve a nearly 80% reduction below the future methane emissions expected without the rule.

In IEA’s Net-Zero Emissions by 2050 (NZE) scenario, energy-related methane emissions decrease by around 75% by 2030—two-thirds of which comes from reducing oil and gas operations emissions. Further, more than 40% of the emissions reductions to 2030 in the NZE Scenario can be achieved with measures that would result in overall savings given the value of the captured gas. These measures include mechanisms to detect and immediately tackle large leaks, replacing pneumatics and pumps, and installing recovery systems. According to IEA, they would require just over 10% of the total spending on methane abatement and can produce results quickly, laying the groundwork for further reductions.

Toby Rice, President and CEO of EQT, said at the 2024 Baker Hughes Annual Meeting (AM) that more than 40% of natural gas producers have already signed on to meet zero or near-zero methane emissions by 2030. In addition to other efforts, EQT—the largest U.S. natural gas producer—is partnering to conduct aerial monitoring of an area the size of France to detect methane emissions. 

The Italian energy company Snam is addressing methane abatement throughout its network: instrumentation upgrades to detect leakage and verify pipeline integrity, as well as equipment to capture and recompress methane gas to boost utilization and efficiency, according to Maria Sferruzza, Executive VP of International Engineering, Construction & Solutions at Snam, who also spoke at the Baker Hughes AM.

One of the big ways oil and gas companies such as bp have reduced their methane emissions is by eliminating flaring. bp aims for zero routine flaring by 2025 at its U.S. onshore operations and globally by 2030. 

Saipem, an Italian multinational oilfield services company, also pledged zero methane leakage by 2030. At the Baker Hughes AM, Alessandro Puliti, the CEO and General Manager, talked about the company’s zero-flaring technology for power plants and other areas of the infrastructure to detect fugitive methane emissions.

“All new design and engineering for our new plants is done to ensure zero flaring and zero fugitive emissions while lowering the physical and environmental footprint,” he said.

One Saipem customer found a way to utilize boil-off gas from its LNG storage facility, which was previously flared or vented, thus improving the efficiency of the ecosystem.

From big-picture site design to hand-held detection cameras, actuators, and aerial technologies such as satellites, airplanes, and drones, the industry uses the latest technologies to detect, reduce, and eliminate leaks and methane emissions.

As they say, less is more. And that’s true in the case of Chevron’s production facilities in the Mustang area in Colorado. The design, completed in 2022, only uses 7.5 surface acres versus the 400 surface acres usually required to deliver the same oil and gas production volume—that’s more than a 95% reduction in surface footprint. The minimal design also lowers lifecycle costs by 15 - 20%.

But it eliminates more than space. Because it produces spec oil direct-to-pipeline, there’s no need for big production tanks, flare systems, or further downstream processing facilities. In addition, flowback technology eliminates air emissions. This design can lower Chevron’s GHG by more than 90%.

The company has been using utility electrical power since 2019 to drill 56 wells, and, when possible, uses grid electricity versus onsite generators to power the drilling rig. This step eliminates 100% NOx and other ozone precursor emissions during the summer months, and close to 75% in colder months when operations require boilers for heat. Plus, it eliminates truck traffic—the design cuts down on more than 152 million miles of truck traffic and associated emissions—and noise from the generators.

 that its goal is simple: “Keep methane in the pipe. We believe methane reductions are possible in the energy industry, and in other key sectors, through the adoption of industry best practices, advancement in measurement technologies, carbon pricing, and methane regulations. Our methane strategy is focused on preventing methane emissions and using advanced detection technologies to validate performance, inform repairs, and improve inventories. We believe this approach can scale quickly across a global asset base, provide actionable information for methane emissions reduction, and augment emissions reporting as protocols become available.”

Oil and gas companies like Chevron use high-tech cameras, such as Teledyne FLIR optical gas imaging (OGI) cameras, in upstream and downstream operations to detect leaks proactively and for regulatory compliance. FLIR OGI cameras quickly scan broad sections of equipment and survey difficult-to-reach areas. They can also detect leaks from safe distances and display invisible gases as clouds of smoke.

“OGI cameras’ largest market is the detection of methane (and other hydrocarbons) in the oil and gas industry from upstream (well pads) to downstream (LNG or refineries),” said Craig O’Neill, the Global Director of Business Development at FLIR. “We also have business in renewable methane industries like biogas production, landfill gas-to-energy, and LNG markets.”

O’Neill said the biggest advantage of handheld OGI cameras is the “ground truth” that the technology shows. Once a leak is detected, the camera stores a video so the technician can share it with coworkers, repair personnel, or environmental professionals. “Many other technologies simply provide an ‘alarm’ that methane is present or a single snapshot image showing methane emissions. While these are great, they don’t tell the whole story of what is happening nor provide a true understanding of the emission event—is it a vent or a leak? Was it an intermittent emission event? Exactly what component is leaking rather than a general area where emissions are present?”

FLIR has cameras in almost every mid-to-large oil and gas operator in the upstream industry, ranging from a single unit to dozens.

Plus, OGI cameras also support the new methane-mitigation industry requirement to quantify emissions detected with technology. For example, the Bayernoil refinery complex in southern Germany integrated a gas detection camera into its leak detection and repair programs and used it to minimize hydrocarbon gas discharges from its piping systems, specifically leaks near flange gaskets.

IBS GmbH, headquartered in Bremen, Germany, conducts in-process analysis and detects gas leaks in biogas facilities. For IBS, using the FLIR GF320 camera not only significantly reduced the time it takes to scan a biogas facility compared to conventional gas detection technology, but it also enabled ground access to difficult areas such as where the tank meets the roof and the inner gas membrane. The case studies were similar for both BP Chemicals and Inspectahire, who said they were able to enhance safety and efficiency—the thermal imaging in FLIR’s cameras allows techs to keep a safe distance, when needed, to detect gas leaks and reduce repair downtime, among other benefits.

With the help of the NGIF Accelerator and its Emissions Testing Center (ETC) program, cleantech startups are developing innovations to tackle methane emissions. The program—operated by the not-for-profit arm of NGIF Capital Corp.—offers dedicated spaces via host sites for these companies to develop, test, and validate their solutions. The four-stage program includes access to the entire gas value chain, including a live gas operations environment.

Through the ETC program, Qube Technologies tested its fixed sensor that continuously, versus intermittently, monitors methane emissions. Since testing at the Tourmaline Oil/Perpetual Energy West Wolf Lake Plant—an ETC program host site—it has deployed over 4,000 sensors at over 1,000 sites, including Canadian operators such as Arc Resources, Enhance Energy, and Ember Resources.

Drones, satellites, and other detection technologies have helped many organizations significantly reduce their emissions. In fact, the Environmental Defense Fund reported on March 4, 2024, that MethaneSAT—a satellite designed to detect and quantify methane emissions—detached from SpaceX Transporter-10 into space. It will circle the Earth 15 times a day and measure changes in methane concentrations as small as three parts per billion.

To reduce emissions at its operations in the Permian Basin, ExxonMobil uses airplanes and helicopters to trail airborne technologies outfitted with methane sensors. It then integrates information collected from flyovers with data from ground-based mobile and fixed sensors remotely monitored from Houston. ExxonMobil said it “reduced methane emissions from all operated assets by nearly half as of year-end 2021 when compared to 2016” and eliminated 100% routine flaring in the Permian Basin, as per the World Bank Zero Routine Flaring Initiative.

Pneumatic devices comprise 40 – 50% of upstream oil and gas methane emissions. Rice said that a certain widely used pneumatic device at EQT turned out to be the company’s biggest source of methane emissions. The company replaced all 9,000 of these devices within 18 months, lowering companywide methane emissions by 70%.

Kathairos Solutions developed a system that uses liquid nitrogen, an inert gas, to power pneumatic devices, thereby replacing instrumental gas and eliminating the need for methane venting. It’s designed for smaller remote well sites, and its adaptable set-up is designed to minimize downtime and reduce operational disruptions.

Mitch Jones, Project Engineer at Kathairos Solutions, said the system gives customers the flexibility to set, commission, and fill the tank before tying it into their system, or Kathairos can facilitate this step. Within the first year of the unit’s commercial availability, 1,000 Kathairos units were installed and offset methane emissions by 40,000 metric tons of CO

Jones said one of its customers in the Rockies region had over 140 tanks installed in less than three months, averaging five tanks installed and tied-in per day. This addressed the needs of 2,500+ wells and around 9,000 pneumatic devices, significantly reducing methane emissions from oil site pneumatics.

Another example from ETC program is Kinitics Automation, a Vancouver-based company whose roots are in the automotive and power-generation industries. The company developed an electric valve actuator to replace methane-venting pneumatic actuators. During tests at one of the ETC program host sites—the University of Calgary and its labs—the actuator’s positional performance was evaluated at a variety of temperatures. Outcomes revealed that the actuator reached the target positions within 0.1% at all tested temperatures and responded to motion commands of 0.25%—the smallest commanded value. In a differential pressure test, the actuator maintained a closed-valve state with a 4,000 kPa(g) differential pressure present across the valve. The electric valve actuator met or exceeded the performance of traditional pneumatic actuators. 

Duke Energy developed its Integrated Methane-Monitoring Platform (IMMP) to detect leaks and measure methane emissions on natural gas distribution systems. It uses a satellite with a short-wave infrared sensor to monitor methane emissions and ground-based technologies such as continuous monitoring sensors, gas cloud imaging cameras, and handheld/portable gas-sensing analyzers.

“IMMP started with satellite captures in Greenville, SC, which helped the team refine, improve, and scale the technology and the methane detection algorithms to various types of local distribution company assets with varying terrain and geography,” said Lauren Crowe, Managing Director of Natural Gas Business Transformation at Duke Energy. 

IMMP has reduced recordable leaks in the Carolinas by more than 85% since its inception in 2022. “Duke Energy’s Natural Gas Business Unit is also using cross-compression technology to capture methane,” Crowe said. “We are also making investments in renewable natural gas, which is considered carbon-neutral because it removes methane from the atmosphere and displaces geological gas.”

The cloud platform ingests and calculates high volumes of real-time leakage data and then quantifies and prioritizes findings in graphic dashboards. Crowe explained that because the technology automates leak detection closer to the source, “pipeline management and operations teams can dispatch repair and maintenance crews to targeted sites for remediation based on near real-time information provided on cloud-enabled mobile devices. Using this method and technology enables us to identify and remediate any leaks in our system quicker and more comprehensively.”

The company’s extension program was selected by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management for nearly $1 million of funding. “As part of our IMMP extension project, we are testing a suite of both top-down and continuous-monitoring technologies with hopes of being able to detect and quantify emissions across all spatial and temporal scales and to evaluate the efficiency and accuracy of the various types of technologies,” Crowe said. The expansion project will include interstate, customer natural gas assets, upstream, and midstream. “The IMMP extension project will help us build a standard admissions, accounting, and reporting framework that will be useful across the entire value chain.”

To hear more about methane emissions in the oil and gas industry, check out our TurboTime podcast episode with the 

From ground-based technologies to site design and aerial innovations, the industry continues to use smart devices to abate methane emissions.

Reducing Methane Emissions in the Oil & Gas Industry

In part II of the TuboTime episode on designing turbomachines, the Myth Busters, Klaus Brun and Rainer Kurz, discuss the accuracy of these design tools, which benchmark testing is still required, and current state-of-the-art tools.

How accurate are these tools? Are the software limitations a part of the software, or are they human input issues?

 It depends on the software, right? There are situations where you need to be fairly accurate. Most finite element analysis (FEA) and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) are reasonably accurate, depending on the input of your boundary conditions. You really need to consider what you're trying to accomplish. Structural FEA is more advanced than CFD. Additionally, the equations being solved are fundamentally more linear, and therefore, the expected results tend to be more precise. You can generally expect to be within a couple of percent. In contrast, with CFD, the equations, as Rainer mentioned earlier, the Navier-Stokes equations, are highly complex and nonlinear partial differential equations. These equations are difficult to solve, and you can end up with very inaccurate results because many approximations are made, especially regarding turbulence modeling and boundary layers. The fidelity of the model is essential since you can't delve down to a molecular level; there's a limit to the size at which you can operate before you must make turbulence assumptions and consider steady state versus transient conditions. There are numerous opportunities for error here, and those are some of the significant ones.

 The issue is fundamentally this: What problem are you trying to solve? If you ask a designer to create a new compressor stage that aligns with the experience level of that company's database, you can likely determine things like efficiency or head-making capability, particularly in terms of aerodynamics, probably within a few percent without ever testing it. However, if you are dealing with something for which there is no reference data—essentially operating in uncharted waters and relying solely on your code—the accuracy is significantly and dramatically lower than that.

How accurate are advanced computational tools like CFD and FEA? Find out in part II of designing turbomachines with the Myth Busters.

TurboTime Podcast: Designing Turbomachines - Part II

Due to advanced manufacturing, data centers, and population growth, Duke Energy partnered with GE Vernova to accelerate the company’s unspecified power projects across six states: North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana.

“As we continue to experience unprecedented growth in our service territories, securing the necessary materials to build critical infrastructure and meet the energy demand is integral to delivering value for our customers and other stakeholders,” said Harry Sideris,

Duke Energy President and CEO. “We value our collaboration with forward-thinking partners who assist us in advancing our energy-modernization strategy.”

GE Vernova will deliver 11 7HA gas turbines and related equipment to Duke Energy, adding to the eight 7HA turbines provided in an earlier contract. Aligning with Duke Energy’s integrated resources initiatives, these onsite assets allow the company to leverage existing infrastructure and transmission lines to lower electricity costs and accelerate production-to-grid timelines. Generating and delivering reliable, low-cost energy enables Duke Energy to accommodate customers within its service area and address emerging growth opportunities in the power landscape.

This agreement with Duke Energy comes on the heels of GE Vernova’s 2-year, 

 in U.S. manufacturing, which includes an expansion of its facility in 

. The investment allocates approximately $300 million to turbine manufacturing for GE Vernova’s Gas Power division in the United States, allowing the company to fulfill large-scale orders for customers like Duke Energy.

“This arrangement with Duke Energy and the significant expansion of our U.S. manufacturing facilities illustrate our ability and commitment to developing solutions that our customers require to meet today and tomorrow’s energy demands,” said Scott Strazik, CEO of GE Vernova. “We are proud to be able to supply these Greenville, SC-manufactured gas turbines to a leading U.S. energy company and service to its consumers.”

Replace traditional manufacturing processes with lean manufacturing lines

Accommodate the record-high demand for gas turbines and electricity, both for new and current customers

Duke Energy Works to Reduce Its Emissions

Duke Energy developed its Integrated Methane-Monitoring Platform (IMMP)

 to detect leaks and measure methane emissions on natural gas distribution systems. It uses a satellite with a short-wave infrared sensor to monitor methane emissions and ground-based technologies such as continuous monitoring sensors, gas cloud imaging cameras, and handheld/portable gas-sensing analyzers.

“IMMP started with satellite captures in Greenville, SC, which helped the team refine, improve, and scale the technology and the methane detection algorithms to various types of local distribution company assets with varying terrain and geography,” said Lauren Crowe, Managing Director of Natural Gas Business Transformation at Duke Energy.

Duke Energy is installing 11 of GE Vernova's 7HA turbines across numerous power projects using current infrastructure and transmission capabilities to satisfy AI-driven demand.

Louis Mann

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