Reducing Flaring: Environmental Goals in Modern Petroleum Refining
For decades, the sight of a flare stack burning bright against the night sky was a symbol of industrial activity. Today, that same flame is viewed as a symbol of waste and environmental negligence. In the modern petroleum refinery, the pressure to reduce flaring has shifted from a mere operational efficiency metric to a core component of corporate climate strategy.
The World Bank’s "Zero Routine Flaring by 2030" initiative has been signed by governments and oil companies representing over 60% of global flaring. But as we approach the deadline, how is the refining sector adapting?
Why Does Flaring Persist?
To understand the solution, we must first understand the problem. Flaring is the controlled burning of natural gas that cannot be processed or sold. In a refinery context, this happens for two main reasons:
Safety Relief: Flare systems are the ultimate safety valve. During a power outage or process upset, pressure builds in vessels and piping. That gas must go somewhere safe—the flare. This "emergency flaring" will likely always be necessary for safety, but it should be sporadic.
Routine Flaring: This is the target. This occurs when it is deemed economically unviable to capture the gas, often because the volume is too small or variable to justify the investment in recovery equipment.
Technological Solutions on the Rise
Modern refineries are employing a "reduce, recover, reuse" strategy to tackle flaring.
Advanced Process Control (APC): The first step is to prevent upsets before they happen. Modern AI and machine learning algorithms can predict pressure buildups and adjust operations in real-time, reducing the frequency of safety events that lead to flaring.
Vapor Recovery Units (VRUs): For routine low-pressure flaring, VRUs act like giant vacuum cleaners. They capture low-pressure gas, compress it, and feed it back into the refinery fuel gas system. Instead of being burned off as waste, this gas is used to fire furnaces and boilers, displacing purchased natural gas.
Floating Liquefied Natural Gas (FLNG) Synergies: While more common in upstream, the concept is trickling down to coastal refineries—the ability to miniaturize gas liquefaction to capture "stranded" gas streams and sell them as transport fuel.
The Economic Argument for Green
Historically, flaring reduction was a "nice-to-have" for public relations. Now, it’s a profit center. With the global volatility of natural gas prices, captured flare gas is a valuable commodity.
Furthermore, methane (the primary component of natural gas) is a potent greenhouse gas—over 25 times more impactful than CO2 over a 100-year period. By converting methane to CO2 through combustion, flaring actually reduces the climate impact compared to simply venting it. However, unburned methane leaks (fugitive emissions) in the process are now under intense scrutiny due to new regulations like the EU Methane Regulation and the U.S. Methane Fee.
The Road Ahead
The goal of zero routine flaring is ambitious but achievable. It requires a shift in mindset from viewing flare gas as a necessary byproduct of waste disposal to viewing it as a misallocated asset.
For the refineries of the future, the flare stack will hopefully become a relic—a piece of safety equipment that is rarely, if ever, lit. In its place will be a closed-loop system where every molecule is accounted for, not just for the sake of compliance, but for the sake of profitability and the planet.
