What is Natural Gas?

Natural gas is one of the cleanest, safest, and most useful forms of energy in our day-to-day lives.

Natural gas is a hydrocarbon, which means it is made up of compounds of hydrogen and carbon. The simplest hydrocarbon is methane; it contains one carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms.

Natural gas can be found by itself or in association with oil. It is both colourless and odourless and is in fact a mixture of hydrocarbons. While mainly methane, the other hydrocarbons include ethane, propane, and butane. Water, oil, sulphur, carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and other impurities may be mixed with the gas when it comes out of the ground. These impurities are removed before the natural gas is delivered to our homes and businesses.

The fact that natural gas is combustible and burns more cleanly than some other energy sources helps reinforce its position as one of the most highly used energy sources.

Natural gas can be measured in a variety of ways, although the most common unit of measurement is the Gigajoule (GJ), which signifies one billion joules, the metric measure for heat or energy. Other measures are Mcf (thousand cubic feet) and Btu (British Thermal Unit).

Natural Gas - Sources

Natural gas is a fossil fuel. This means it originates from the remains of plants and animals that lived many millions of years ago. These organisms were buried and exposed to heat as a result of being highly compressed underneath thousands of metres of soil and rock. These forces transformed the once living organisms into natural gas.

Natural gas is found in reservoirs beneath the surface of the earth. Large layers of rock trap the natural gas as it tries to float to the surface. Although the areas where the gas is trapped are referred to as pools, the natural gas molecules are actually held in small holes and cracks throughout the rock formation.

Geologists, using sophisticated technology, help locate potential pools of natural gas, so they know where to drill a well to extract gas. However, due to the complexity of locating natural gas trapped many metres, and sometimes kilometres, below the surface, the exploration process is not always successful.

Once removed from an underground reservoir, the natural gas is usually transferred to a gas processing plant to remove impurities and by-products. Some of these by-products, including ethane, propane, butane, and sulphur, are extracted for other uses. After being processed, the clean natural gas (almost pure methane) is transported through a network of pipelines and delivered to its point of use, including our homes.

Natural Gas - Users

Users of natural gas are often classified into three categories - residential, commercial, and industrial.

Residential:

We require energy on a constant basis to heat our water, cook our food, warm our homes, and generate our electricity. Natural gas is one of the least expensive forms of energy available to Alberta residential consumers. The most common use for natural gas around the home is for furnaces and hot water tanks. Natural gas can also be used to operate various household appliances, including stoves, clothes dryers, fireplaces, and barbecues. Through the use of natural gas, we can be sure our homes are operating efficiently, safely and economically.

Commercial:

Schools, office buildings, hotels, restaurants and many other commercial enterprises use natural gas. As with residences, these enterprises use the gas mainly for heating, cooling, and cooking. Large commercial enterprises are also beginning to use natural gas for on-site electricity generation as an economical alternative to purchasing electricity off-site.

Industrial:

Just over 40 per cent of the natural gas consumed in Alberta is used by the industrial sector. It has numerous uses in the petroleum refining, metal, chemical, plastic, food processing, glass and paper industries. The ingredients for plastic, anti-freeze, fertilizer, and fabric products are formed through the use of natural gas by-products. The fact that natural gas is one of the cleanest, cheapest, and most efficient sources of energy makes it easy to see why it is so commonly used. Alberta continues to be the Canadian leader in an extremely successful and expanding energy sector.

Alberta supplies about 80 per cent of Canada’s natural gas consumption needs.