What Chemicals are Used to Produce the Characteristic Odors in Natural or LP Gas?
Mercaptan, a widely-recognized odorant is added to natural gas or bottled gas to assist in recognizing that a dangerous gas leak is present since natural gas alone, CH4 (Methane) is odorless. The product added to natural gas to provide it with a characteristic odor is a mixture of tertiary butyl mercaptan, dimethyl sulfide and n-hexane. Commonly in the trades the gas odorant product is just called “mercaptan”. Mercaptan is added to natural gas at a rate of 0.08cc’s/1.0 m3 of natural gas. Therefore very little mercaptan in the gas stream. According to one of our industry correspondents, odorants need to be detectible in the natural gas at 1/5 the lethal exposure level (LEL), so this is the amount of natural gas required in the test. A person is exposed to very little natural gas in the air by the time they smell it.
