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This investigation was prepared by Hala Nouhad Nasreddine and supported by Journalismfund Europe

As global awareness and concern grow regarding the environmental impacts of industrial activities, gas flaring remains a significant, yet often overlooked, contributor to pollution and climate change. Annually, gas flaring generates more than 350 million tons of CO2 emissions, a practice that not only releases carbon dioxide but also potent greenhouse gases like methane.

The United Arab Emirates continues routine gas flaring despite its commitment to end the practice two decades ago. However, satellite imagery and data reveal that gas flaring occurs almost daily in many oil and gas fields, particularly those operated by the national oil company ADNOC, posing substantial environmental and health challenges. Globally, the United Nations estimates that reducing methane emissions by 45% over the current decade could prevent 260,000 premature deaths, 775,000 asthma-related hospital visits, and 25 million tons of crop losses.

Beyond its environmental toll, gas flaring presents significant health risks, with annual health-related damages in the United States estimated at $7.4 billion. This practice is linked to approximately 700 premature deaths and triggers 73,000 asthma attacks each year, highlighting the critical need for robust strategies to mitigate these alarming effects.

This investigation is part of a series within the cross-border project “Burning Skies,” which explores gas flaring—commonly referred to as flaring. The project is led by the European Investigative Collaborations (EIC), in partnership with the Environmental Investigative Forum (EIF) and several media platforms, including Daraj. 

The project examines gas flaring emissions in 18 countries across Africa and the Middle East. The project team integrated gas flaring emission data from Skytruth with maps of oil and gas concessions and permits to calculate annual emissions from flaring at each site—whether oil fields, gas fields, refineries, or liquefied natural gas plants—in several countries, including the UAE, Qatar, and Oman, from 2012 to 2022.

“Gas flaring refers to the burning of natural gas that is produced alongside oil extraction. This practice has existed since oil production began over 160 years ago… Flaring and venting waste of a valuable natural resource that could be used for productive purposes, such as power generation or conservation. For example, the current amount of gas flared annually – about 148 billion cubic meters – could supply energy to the entire sub-Saharan African region,” according to the World Bank.

Gas flaring significantly contributes to global greenhouse gas emissions, with the UAE alone flaring 48.8 billion cubic meters of gas between 2012 and 2022, resulting in about 126 million tons of CO2 emissions during that period, according to the project data.

According to a previous investigation by the BBC, “pollutants released from flaring include fine particulate matter (PM2.5), Ozone, nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and benzo(a)pyrene (BaP) which at high levels or continued exposure have been linked to strokes, cancer, asthma, and heart disease, according to international experts, including the World Health Organization (WHO).” Alarmingly, the report revealed that asthma rates in the UAE are among the highest globally.”

UAE’s COP28: Is It Climate Action or Corporate Exploitation?

At the end of 2023, the United Arab Emirates hosted the 28th Climate Conference (COP28) in Dubai, where, as is customary, a flurry of promises and commitments filled the air. A significant portion of the discussions revolved around fossil fuels and the imperative shift toward renewable energy. The fate of fossil fuels emerged as a pivotal theme at COP28, with developed nations, including the European Union and the United States, advocating for a rapid transition to renewable sources. They introduced non-binding deadlines aimed at curbing the unrestricted use of fossil fuels. In contrast, countries like Russia, China, and Saudi Arabia pushed back against setting specific timelines, arguing that such measures would disproportionately target fossil fuels while overlooking other sources of climate-related pollution.

During the United Nations Climate Change Conference, participating countries reached a consensus advocating for a “shift” towards phasing out fossil fuels to attain carbon neutrality by 2050, aligning with scientific recommendations. However, the final agreement notably omitted the contentious phrase “phase out,” which had sparked considerable debate. Instead, the text opted for the more ambiguous term “transitioning away,” and the conference was extended by an additional day to secure this agreement.

The conference also spotlighted the urgent need to significantly reduce methane emissions by 2030. To this end, a Decarbonization Charter for Oil and Gas was introduced, setting ambitious goals to eliminate routine flaring and achieve near-zero upstream methane emissions by that same year.

COP28’s presidency, led by Sultan al-Jaber, the CEO of ADNOC, faced criticism over potential conflicts of interest due to his dual role. Leaked documents obtained by the BBC revealed that the UAE planned to leverage its position as host of the UN climate talks to secure oil and gas deals. The leaked documents disclosed plans to discuss fossil fuel deals with 15 nations. Among the proposals was one for China, stating that ADNOC, the UAE’s national oil company, was “willing to jointly evaluate international LNG [liquefied natural gas] opportunities” in Mozambique, Canada, and Australia, according to the BBC.

UAE Snubs World Bank’s Zero Routine Flaring Initiative!

Despite hosting the 2023 Climate Conference, the United Arab Emirates is not a signatory to the World Bank’s “Zero Routine Flaring” (ZRF) initiative, which pledges to end routine flaring by 2030.

The investigation highlights a troubling trend in the UAE, where the total volume of gas flaring surged from approximately 1.63 billion cubic meters in 2012 to around 2 billion cubic meters by 2022. This increase corresponded with a rise in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, escalating from about 4.2 million tons in 2012 to roughly 5.3 million tons a decade later.

Since 1999, gas flaring in the UAE has been subject to regulation, requiring government approval and compliance with emissions limits under Abu Dhabi’s Environmental Protection Law (Law No. 24 of 1999) and the Petroleum Resources Conservation Law (Law No. 8 of 1978). However, the investigation uncovered evidence that numerous operating companies and sites continue to engage in gas flaring, raising concerns about adherence to these regulations.

Gas leaks cost the UAE a significant amount of wealth, with an estimated $800 million worth of gas leaked and flared in 2022. This alarming figure comes from research by Capterio, a company specializing in tracking global flaring, as published by the Atlantic Council’s research center.

Although the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) adopted a voluntary policy to prevent routine gas flaring two decades ago, this policy has not been effectively implemented, as evident from recent data based on satellite imagery. For example, the volume of flaring at ADNOC-operated sites alone ranged between 8.6 and 11.3 billion cubic meters, resulting in the emission of approximately 22.3 to 29.2 million tons of CO2 in the UAE from 2012 to 2022.

The World Bank described flaring as “wasteful and polluting.” “Flaring occurs when equipment to capture gas is not installed or when gas must be released unexpectedly for safety reasons. This practice also allows some unburned methane to escape, which is a potent greenhouse gas. According to data prepared by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) for The Guardian, gas was flared at ADNOC’s LNG plant on more than 99% of the days observed by satellites from 2018 to 2022,” according to The Guardian.

ADNOC’s LNG plant on Das Island, an island off the coast of Abu Dhabi that has been almost entirely repurposed as a giant gas refinery, flared 157 million cubic meters of gas in 2022. This figure surpasses the total flaring from all of Norway’s oil and gas fields combined, which amounted to 135 million cubic meters in the same year, according to an investigation by Desmog published in November 2023.

The Data:

The project reveals that the following sites/licenses in the UAE have experienced high levels of gas flaring for many years, indicating that the operators of these licenses engaged in routine flaring from 2012 to 2022:

Abu Al Bukhoosh (operated by TotalEnergies): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 7.5 billion cubic meters
CO₂ Emissions: 19.4 million tons

Das Island LNG Facility (operated by ADNOC, Mitsui, BP, and TotalEnergies): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 1.7 billion cubic meters
CO₂ Emissions: 4.3 million tons

Falah, Fateh, Rashid, Southwest Fateh Conventional Oil Fields (operated by Dubai Petroleum Company): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 1.46 billion cubic meters
CO₂ Emissions: 3.7 million tons

Bab (operated by BP, TotalEnergies, ADNOC, JODCO): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 1.15 billion cubic meters
CO₂ Emissions: 2.9 million tons

Ruwais Refinery (operated by ADNOC): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 0.9 billion cubic meters
CO₂ Emissions: 2.4 million tons

Offshore Block 1 (operated by ENI): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 0.8 billion cubic meters

CO₂ Emissions: 2.1 million tons

Asab (General) (operated by BP, TotalEnergies, ADNOC, JODCO): 

Total Flaring Volume: Approximately 0.56 billion cubic meters
CO₂ Emissions: 1.46 million tons

All Roads Lead to ADNOC!

An investigation published in November 2023 revealed that “state-owned oil and gas fields across the UAE have been persistently flaring gas, despite a long-standing policy aimed at eliminating ‘routine’ flaring in their operations,” according to The Guardian and DeSmog. Their findings indicated that a single gas field operated by the national oil company ADNOC flared more gas last year than the combined total from all oil and gas fields in Norway.

The data released by The Guardian and DeSmog’s investigation, along with findings from this project, reveal that ADNOC’s LNG field, along with several other fields in the UAE, continues to emit and flare polluting methane gas. This ongoing issue persists despite ADNOC’s two-decade-old policy aimed at eliminating this harmful practice from daily operations.

ADNOC’s website, in its “Sustainability Pillars 2030 ٍtrategy,” outlines several targets, including:

Achieving zero routine flaring by 2030.

Advancing toward our ambition of achieving net zero by 2045.

Reducing upstream methane intensity by 15% by 2025.

Safely sequestering 10 million tons of CO2 annually by 2030.

Achieving near-zero methane emissions in our operations by 2030.

However, project data reveals that the volume of routine flaring by the company increased from approximately 0.92 billion cubic meters in 2012 to around 1.7 billion cubic meters in 2022, with CO2 emissions rising from approximately 2.39 million tons in 2012 to about 4.4 million tons in 2022.

Project estimates based on satellite imagery data show that the volume of flaring at ADNOC can be estimated at approximately 11.1 billion cubic meters, resulting in emissions of about 31.1 million tons of CO2 in the UAE from 2012 to 2022.

Neither ADNOC nor the UAE government responded to the project team’s questions as of the time of publication.

European Companies:

European companies have a significant share in routine flaring in the Middle East and North Africa, including the UAE. These European companies, which are supposedly following strict sustainability and routine gas flaring laws while operating in the UAE, are:

TotalEnergies: A French multinational energy company. According to its website, “As a founding member of the World Bank’s Zero Routine Flaring by 2030 initiative launched in 2015, we are committed to ending routine flaring by 2030.”

BP: A British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London. Its website states: “We remain on track to eliminate routine flaring by 2030, in line with our goal as part of the World Bank’s Zero Routine Flaring initiative.”

ENI: An Italian multinational energy company headquartered in Rome. According to its website, the company is “committed to decarbonizing our operations by gradually reducing methane emissions and routine flaring while investing in energy efficiency. We plan to achieve net zero emissions (scope 1+2) for upstream operations by 2030 and for all of ENI’s operations by 2035.”

The three companies are considered “giants” in the oil and gas industry, and they all commit to reducing routine gas flaring. However, data shows that:

TotalEnergies reduced its gas flaring from 1.4 billion cubic meters in 2012 (with 3.7 million tons of CO2 emissions) to 0.54 billion cubic meters in 2022 (with 1.4 million tons of CO2 emissions).

BP maintained almost the same level of gas flaring, from 0.6 billion cubic meters in 2012 (with 1.6 million tons of CO2 emissions) to 0.5 billion cubic meters in 2022 (with 1.4 million tons of CO2 emissions).

ENI, which started operations in the UAE in 2019, kept its flaring at 0.2 billion cubic meters in 2019 (with around 545,000 tons of CO2 emissions) and 0.2 billion cubic meters in 2022 (with around 582,000 tons of CO2 emissions).

The UAE Law

Gas flaring in the UAE has been regulated since 1999, requiring government approval and adherence to emissions limits under the Abu Dhabi Environmental Protection Law (Law No. 24 of 1999) and the Abu Dhabi Petroleum Resources Conservation Law (Law No. 8 of 1978). However, we have identified operators who continue to engage in gas flaring.

Abu Dhabi’s Law No. 8 of 1978 – The Conservation of Petroleum Resources Law:Article 43:Production from condensate hydrocarbon reservoirs requires the re-injection of excess gas into the reservoir. If this is not economically justified, the gas must be utilized.Article 44:The operating entity must take all appropriate measures to utilize the associated gas for any of the following purposes, if economically justified:Maintaining reservoir pressure, in accordance with recognized technical methods in the petroleum industry.Using it in production operations, or as fuel for the operating entity’s facilities.Article 45:If the operating entity does not use the gas for any of the purposes mentioned in the previous article, it must deliver the gas at a point outside its industrial zone, as determined by an agreement between the entity and the department.Article 46:Any associated gas that is not utilized as per the provisions of the previous two articles must, under the instructions of the department, be injected into petroleum-bearing formations, other suitable layers, or underground reservoirs, according to recognized petroleum industry practices. If this utilization is not possible, the gas must be safely disposed of, and gas flaring is not permitted without the department’s written approval.Article 47:The operating entity is not allowed to produce non-associated gas unless all associated gas production has been fully utilized, or if the department has authorized such production.