A Looming US “Carbon Bomb”In Dubai last month, the world’s governments reached a landmark agreement to “transition away from fossil fuels.”
More green propaganda: Hydrocarbons won’t be transition away from several decades.
A Looming US “Carbon Bomb”
In Dubai last month, the world’s governments reached a landmark agreement to “transition away from fossil fuels.” Now, the Biden administration faces a defining test of its commitment to that scientific imperative: a massive proposed expansion of liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facilities in the US. As president, Joe Biden has the executive authority either to block or approve these facilities, a decision likely to impact his climate reputation among young voters and thus, possibly, his reelection chances.
“The buildout of LNG exports on the Gulf Coast is probably the biggest single carbon bomb on the planet — and probably the easiest to defuse,” Bill McKibben told Covering Climate Now. "If you’re serious about a transition away from fossil fuels, then you simply can’t grant licenses for a vast array of export terminals designed to last five decades.”
McKibben has done some of the most important climate reporting of the past year on this looming gas expansion. Since 2016, the US has built several gas export terminals that lock in shipments of fossil fuels overseas for decades to come. In 2022, the US became the world’s largest LNG exporter. Currently, at least 20 more terminals are awaiting Biden administration approval.
“Taken together, if all US projects in the permitting pipeline are approved, they could lead to 3.9 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions annually, which is larger than the entire annual emissions of the European Union,” wrote a group of scientists in an open letter to Biden in December urging the president to halt the expansion.
The fossil fuel industry over the past couple of decades has sold the public hard on fossil gas, claiming that “natural gas” is a “bridge fuel” between coal and renewables. But in fact, “Total greenhouse gas emissions from LNG are larger than those from domestically produced coal, ranging from 18% to 185% greater,” according to a soon-to-be released study by the dean of fossil gas scientists, Cornell University’s Robert Howarth.
The larger scientific picture is clear: Humanity must halve all fossil fuel emissions by 2030 and zero them out by 2050 to prevent the worst of the climate crisis. Good reporting can help audiences understand that scientific imperative, and how a massive LNG expansion fails that test.
Nor would the proposed LNG expansion appear to be in the self-interest of either candidate Biden or American consumers: Since these facilities are expressly intended to send US gas to customers overseas, the likely economic effect would be to raise gas prices at home. Indeed, exporting gas has already raised winter heating bills, and those bills could get more expensive if more terminals are approved. Early last year, the Biden administration’s decision not to fight the Willow Project dented his reputation as a climate-conscious president, and the Guardian reported last week that young voters are dismayed by administration concessions to oil and gas.
Activists are now loudly organizing against the possible new LNG export terminals, and plan to stage a sit-in at the Department of Energy in early February. Last week, the administration announced it would reevaluate the criteria it uses to consider gas export projects. We will undoubtedly see plenty of political spin in the weeks to come on this story. What’s indisputable is that the planet simply cannot handle this “carbon bomb.” Audiences deserve clear-eyed reporting of this fact