Flaring

Routine flaring of gas occurs during normal oil production if it is not possible to use the gas or reinject it into a well.

We are working to reduce flaring, which is inefficient and contributes to climate change. We have set a target to eliminate routine flaring from our Upstream operations by 2025 [A], challenging ourselves to move faster than the World Bank’s Zero Routine Flaring by 2030 initiative, to which we are a signatory.

[A] Subject to the completion of the sale of Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited (SPDC).

We signed up to the Oil and Gas Decarbonization Charter announced at COP28, within which organisations have pledged to achieve near-zero methane emissions by 2030 and zero routine flaring by 2030. We also intend to contribute to the World Bank’s Global Flaring and Methane Reduction Fund, which was launched at COP28.

Flaring performance

Flaring of gas in our Integrated Gas and Upstream business contributed around 6% of our overall direct greenhouse gas emissions in 2023.

In 2023, 0.7 million tonnes of hydrocarbons were flared in our Integrated Gas and Upstream business, down from 0.8 million tonnes in 2022.

Routine hydrocarbon flaring remained relatively flat compared with 2022 at 0.1 million tonnes.

Around 50% of total routine and non-routine flaring in our Integrated Gas and Upstream facilities in 2023 occurred in assets operated by Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC) and Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company Limited (SNEPCo). On January 16, 2024, Shell reached an agreement to sell SPDC to Renaissance, a consortium of five companies, subject to approvals by the Federal Government of Nigeria and other conditions. SPDC will continue to operate the SPDC joint venture (SPDC JV) [A] on behalf of all the joint-venture partners, who together will continue to make decisions relating to work programmes for the SPDC JV’s assets and infrastructure. This includes work programmes to eliminate routine flaring.

[A] The SPDC JV comprises SPDC Ltd (30%), the government-owned NNPC (55%), Total Exploration and Production Nigeria Ltd (10%) and Nigeria Agip Oil Company Ltd (5%).

In 2023, around 10% of our greenhouse gas emissions from flaring occurred at facilities where there was no infrastructure to capture the gas, which is similar to the percentage in 2022. Overall flaring decreased to 2.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) in 2023 from 3.0 million tonnes of CO₂e in 2022 due to a reduction in flaring from some assets including the Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company (SNEPCo) in 2023.

Read more about our flaring reduction commitment at www.shell.com/what-we-do/oil-and-natural-gas/flaring.