In his new
brilliant piece for
Mother Jones, Bill McKibben connects the dots showing the evidence why fracking for natural gas (methane) may be even worse in building carbon emissions than our current Earth killing use of coal. He disputes the use of natural gas as 'the bridge' to a sustainable energy future. He accuses the Obama administration of moving us in the wrong direction by supporting natural gas fracking.
If you're a politician, science is a bitch; it resists spin. And a new set of studies—about, of all things, a simple molecule known as CH4—show that President Obama's climate change strategy is starting to unravel even as it's being knit. To be specific: Most of the administration's theoretical gains in the fight against global warming have come from substituting natural gas for coal. But it looks now as if that doesn't really help.
There are so many problems with fracking for natural gas, but the one Bill McKibben is focusing on in this article is the massive problem with methane leaks. They are so numerous and so potent that they make fracking for natural gas more of a problem then a solution to sustainable energy. The problem with the leaks is that there are no really good solutions to eliminating them. They can be slowed somewhat by regulation and intense monitoring (we know how effective that is). But the major problem with fracking and natural gas is that it draws investment away from where it needs to be. We lose precious time in building an infrastructure for natural gas when that time and money could be directly allocated to clean energy such as solar and wind.
It turns out, in other words, that there's no easy bridge to a working climate future—no way to avoid angering powerful interests, no way to put off actually building the clean energy we desperately need. It's time to stop searching for a bridge and simply take the leap.
This is a must read. Bill makes the case for changing our direction regarding natural gas and fracking. I hope the right people read this. We don't have time to waste.