Assessing emissions from LNG supply and abatement options
About this report
Drawing on the latest and best available data, this report provides a comprehensive estimate of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across the global liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply chain in 2025, including upstream production and processing, pipeline transmission to liquefaction terminals, liquefaction, shipping and regasification.
It also assesses technically available options to reduce these emissions, including methane abatement, improvements in process efficiency, electrification using low-emissions electricity, reductions in flaring, and carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS). The report also discusses policy and finance considerations that can support the deployment of these measures across the LNG value chain.
This report updates and replaces a preliminary version published in 2025.
Introduction
Global liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply has grown faster than overall natural gas demand in recent years. Around 580 billion cubic metres (bcm) of natural gas were exported as LNG in 2025, equivalent to about 13% of global natural gas consumption. LNG’s share of the gas market is set to increase further, with a wave of new projects coming online over the next several years.
Previous International Energy Agency (IEA) analysis found that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from extracting, processing and transporting natural gas through pipelines, and as LNG, are globally on average around 11.5 grammes of carbon dioxide equivalent per megajoule (g CO2-eq/MJ). Given that about 55 g CO2/MJ are emitted when natural gas is combusted, extracting natural gas and bringing it to consumers represents nearly 17% of its life‑cycle emissions.
There is a broad range of emissions from extracting, processing and transporting natural gas. Due to the high energy requirements to liquefy and transport gas over long distances, LNG tends to have higher emissions than natural gas produced close to where it is consumed. Emissions from gas transported by pipeline also vary widely, often in proportion to the distances involved.
Several importing countries are increasing their efforts to assess the emissions intensity of oil and gas imports through different approaches, such as the EU Methane Emissions Reduction Regulation (EU MER) and the Coalition for LNG Emissions Abatement toward Net-zero (CLEAN).
Producer-side measurement and reporting frameworks such as the Oil and Gas Methane Partnership (OGMP 2.0) are bringing greater visibility and structure to emissions tracking. Reporting and availability of natural gas value chain emissions data have increased significantly in recent years, but estimates remain highly uncertain.
Building on previous IEA work looking at GHG emissions from all sources of natural gas, at the LNG Producer Consumer Conference (LNGPCC) 2024, the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the IEA launched a two-year work programme to look in detail at emissions from LNG supply and abatement options. An interim report was published in 2025, with this final version prepared to inform dialogue at LNGPCC 2026.
This report provides estimates of emissions from LNG supply in 2025, based on the latest and best available production data and estimates from scientific studies and measurement campaigns.
Chapter 1 provides estimates of emissions from natural gas production and processing, pipeline transmission to export terminals, liquefaction, shipping and regasification at import terminals. It considers energy consumption, methane emissions, flaring and naturally occurring sources of CO2.
Chapter 2 explores mitigation options, including pathways to reduce methane emissions and flaring, improve efficiency across the LNG value chain, electrify key processes and deploy carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS).
Chapter 3 discusses the policy and finance frameworks that can support emissions reductions along the LNG supply chain.
This report does not assess emissions from gas distribution after regasification, end-use combustion, avoided or additional emissions from fuel switching to or from LNG, or emissions associated with other potential LNG sources (e.g. biomethane or e‑methane).
What has changed since the interim report published in 2025?
In June 2025, the IEA released an interim report that provided estimates of emissions from the LNG supply chain and associated abatement options for 2024. Several changes since then are reflected in this report, including the addition of 2025 data and new scientific and measurement studies.
LNG exports in 2025 were around 30 bcm higher than in 2024, driven by capacity additions in the United States (Corpus Christi Stage 3 and Plaquemines LNG). New LNG producers also entered the market, including Canada (LNG Canada), Mexico (Fast LNG Altamira), Mauritania and Senegal (through the shared Greater Tortue Ahmeyim floating LNG facility).
Several new studies have been published since the interim report, including Pandey et al. (2026), Zhang et al. (2026), Zhu et al. (2025) and Ma et al. (2025). Updates from the IEA’s Global Methane Tracker, the addition of real-world shipping emissions data from the European Union Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) database, and an update to feed gas mapping to liquefaction terminals have also been incorporated.
In this report, we estimate that the global average emissions intensity of LNG from production to regasification is 18.6 g CO2-eq/MJ of LNG delivered, slightly lower than the value published in the interim report (19.4 g CO2-eq/MJ of LNG delivered). Further details of changes to the underlying data, methodology and model assumptions are available in the Technical annex.