Independent monitoring of methane emissions shows that the gas industry is demonstrating utter neglect and carelessness towards the environment by terrifying inaction even on self-supporting methane emissions reductions, which are available at no expense or positive net cost, and creating a grave threat to humanity by pushing the world towards irreversible climate tipping points.
Expansion of the natural gas infrastructure hinders a renewable energy future and is no bridge technology. It is a fossil fuel with a significantly underestimated climate impact. Over a 20-year period, methane has 86 times more warming potential than CO2.
Reducing methane emissions is seen as a critical component of efforts to mitigate climate change, as it is a potent greenhouse gas that has a relatively short atmospheric lifetime (around 12 years). Therefore, reducing methane emissions can have a more immediate impact on reducing warming in the near term.
There is evidence that the massive deployment of shale gas extraction since 2007 has contributed to the accelerated rise in atmospheric concentration of methane. Shale gas extraction involves the hydraulic fracturing of shale rock formations to release natural gas, which can result in significant methane emissions.
Methane can be released during every stage of the shale gas extraction process, including well drilling, well completion, hydraulic fracturing, and transportation. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its 2019 Special Report on Climate Change and Land highlighted the role of shale gas production in increasing atmospheric methane concentrations. In this context, exports of US shale gas to Europe via LNG is not an energy security solution, but a growing and dire threat to climate.
EU climate targets can only be met with a reduction in gas demand of at least 35 percent compared with 2019 levels by 2030. Expanding gas export and import infrastructure makes no sense at the time when the world needs to move rapidly away from fossil fuels to stop massively expensive destructive impacts of climate change, which are costing trillions. Today it is nothing else but a frivolous waste of public money to support investments in gas infrastructure, when over the long term gas demand is falling as cheaper renewable energy production booms.
Notorious is the fact that the global oil and gas industry would have to invest only 3% of the income it earned in 2022, $100 billion, to reduce its methane emissions by 75%, according to the latest IEA report. Yet they didn’t and even having unprecedented commercial incentives they do next to nothing to cut methane emissions. The gas dealers have totally compromised their social license by becoming the embodiment of greed and neglect. They pay little attention to the climate impacts their product causes and continue to expand gas infrastructure, contributing to fossil-fueled violence and denying us the right to a liveable planet.
Moreover, western companies plan to massively build out new LNG infrastructure, including contribution to construction of the Arctic LNG-2 terminal in Russia, which could be one of the final straws to break the camel's back regarding climate change: it can put the 1.5 degree Paris Agreement climate target off reach. If finished and launched with equipment and services provided by Baker Hughes, Siemens, Technip and GTT, the Arctic LNG-2 can set a fuse to Russian carbon bombs - unlocking extraction at new gas fields and further gas exploration in the Arctic, which is a death threat to climate and environment. Enacting a full set of sanctions to immediately pull the plug for Russia’s LNG expansion plans is the first obvious step to start. Without such action there’s no credibility for claimed climate action leadership by the EU and US.
Globally, a massive expansion of natural gas infrastructure is underway: almost 500 GW of natural gas-fired power plants are planned or under construction. According to Global Energy Monitor new LNG import terminals with a capacity of 635 million tonnes of natural gas per year as well as LNG export terminals with a capacity of 700 million tonnes per year are under development.
The EU is already the largest LNG importer in the world. The EU's overall LNG import capacity is around 157 bcm in regasified form per year – enough to meet around 40% of the continent's total gas demand. Expanding gas infrastructure makes no sense at the time when we need to move rapidly away from fossil fuels to stop massive negative economic impacts of catastrophic runaway climate change. As clean energy has become the cheapest form of energy, now is the time not to give public subsidies to climate damaging gas, but to radically ramp up investments in solutions like wind and solar. Only with such solutions will the globe stay on the path towards the 1.5°C goal of the Paris Agreement, and achieve true energy security.
