Russia-Ukraine war: Unwanted Russian oil and gas pose big environmental risk

The trade sanctions imposed by Western nations on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine have meant that the biggest oil and gas exporters are now left with additional stocks of the two resources with nowhere to send them to.

Environmental experts claim that oil and gas tankers stranded at sea could cause extra methane leaks into the environment. If the country is further forced to reduce its fossil fuel production, it could also eventually lead to the wells becoming a major source of methane leaks.

"This crisis just keeps emphasising the problems with fossil fuels," Simon Cran-McGreehin from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) told The Independent.

"If no-one's willing to use this Russian gas... it poses a real environmental conundrum," he added. Several other experts have also echoed similar sentiments stating that methane leaks pose a climate risk.

"Storing and transporting oil whether in tankers, storage tanks, or pipelines account for about 50 percent of all methane emissions associated with the oil sector. The longer oil is stored, the more it evaporates." said Roman Sidortsov, who works at the University of Sussex.

"Shut-in wells, especially if they have not been shut in properly, are major sources of methane emissions," he added.

According to the International Energy Agency, Russia was also the world's leading producer of methane emissions last year due to its oil and gas operations.

The European Union has decided to gradually ban all sorts of Russian fossil fuel imports by the end of the decade, while the UK had decided to phase out Russian oil by the end of the year.

The United States has also banned all imports of Russian oil and gas. The announcement about the same was made by President Joe Biden earlier this week. Oil giants BP and Shell have also announced an immediate halt to Russian oil and gas purchases and the European Union planned to slash gas imports by two-thirds.

Currently, the EU gets 45 percent of its oil imports from Russia while the United States imports only 8 percent of its oil from Russia.

Meanwhile, Russia has claimed that they still have enough buyers for their oil and gas. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavro at a press briefing said: "We will not persuade anyone to buy our oil and gas. If they want to replace it with something, they are welcome, we will have supply markets, we already have them."