When oil is found together with natural gas, oil companies may burn the gas to separate it from the oil. Burning gas makes giant flares that light up the sky and make a loud, terrible noise. Gas flaring is dangerous, wasteful, and very polluting. Oil companies can sell the gas rather than burn it off.

But venting mainly emits methane, which contributes to global warming and atmospheric ozone formation. Venting from flare stacks is illegal, since the flare is considered a waste treatment facility, but the practice apparently has increased over time.

The tall, thin structure with flames or steam coming out of the top is called a flare stack. It’s a gas combustion device used at industrial sites to burn off waste or other unwanted gases.

Through the practice of flaring, methane is oxidized (through combustion) to carbon dioxide (CO2) and water. From an environmental standpoint, flaring is better than venting since CO2 is 25 times less impactful as a greenhouse gas than methane over a 100-year timespan.

It is common to flare natural gas that contains hydrogen sulfide (i.e., sour gas), in order to convert the highly toxic hydrogen sulfide gas into less toxic compounds. Flares emit a host of air pollutants, depending on the chemical composition of the gas being burned and the efficiency and temperature of the flare.

Global Gas Flaring Statistics Annually, 140 billion cubic meters (BCM) of natural gas is flared worldwide.

Flares are important safety devices used in refineries and petrochemical facilities. They safely burn excess hydrocarbon gases which cannot be recovered or recycled. During flaring, excess gases are combined with steam and/or air, and burnt off in the flare system to produce water vapour and carbon dioxide.

Costs for a flare are estimated to be $3,000 based on partner experiences (which vary significantly and are often between $1,000 and $5,000). In addition, and there is a fuel cost of $1,800 per year for each pilot (at $3 per Mcf of gas).

By 1984, flaring had been made technically illegal, but the companies could get around the law by paying a penalty or fine. The World Bank estimated that flaring was responsible for 35 million tons of CO2 with 12 million tonnes of methane produced from Rivers and Delta States alone.

To many, natural gas flaring is a black and white issue—flaring is bad, no flaring is good. The mere sight of a flare stack burning on a well pad can create negative public opinion and erode shareholder value.

Drawbacks of Flaring Flaring of natural gas does contribute to climate change, because it releases carbon dioxide. Additionally, depending on the purity of the natural gas there are other harmful emissions, such as sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides, which combine with moisture in the atmosphere to form acid rain.

Build local gas-fired power plants to supply power for hydrocarbon operations, local industrial uses, residential electrification, or injection into the grid. Pipe gas to local industrial enterprises for heat and/or power generation. Build compressed natural gas (CNG) fueling stations for vehicles or other uses.

During plant or partial plant startups and shutdowns, flare stacks are also often used for the planned combustion of gases over relatively short periods. Gas flaring at many oil and gas production sites protects against the dangers of over-pressuring industrial plant equipment.

North Dakota Flaring of Gas. In industrial plants, flare stacks are primarily used for burning off flammable gas released by pressure relief valves during unplanned over-pressuring of plant equipment.

The flare tip can have several configurations: a Coanda tip – a profiled tip using the Coanda effect to entrain air into the gas to improve combustion. The height of a flare stack, or the reach of a flare boom, is determined by the thermal radiation that is permissible or tolerable for equipment or personnel to be exposed to.

A gas flare, or flare stack, is a gas combustion device used in industrial plants such as petroleum refineries, chemical plants, natural gas processing plants, and at oil or gas production sites with oil wells, offshore oil and gas rigs/platforms and landfills