Justin Miller at the Texas Observer writes—As Fossil Fuel Industry Invests Billions in New Texas Facilities, it Could Unleash a Huge Emissions Bomb:
A hulking new $10 billion ethane cracker near Corpus Christi set for completion by 2022. A trio of approved liquified natural gas export terminals near Brownsville that could be up and running by the end of 2023. A $5 billion ethylene processing plant in Orange County planned to start operating in 2024. A $6.6 billion petrochemical expansion in Port Arthur that could be online by mid-decade.
The explosive boom in the oil and gas industry has ushered in a rapid, nationwide buildup of new oil, gas, and petrochemical facilities across the supply chain. In Texas and Louisiana alone, this new infrastructure could lead to more than half-a-billion tons of added greenhouse gas emissions each year by 2030, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Texas at Austin. That’s equivalent to 8 percent of the United States’ current annual emissions and is roughly equal to emissions from 131 coal-fired power plants.
The report is unique in that it not only measures the projected emissions at the site of drilling, a well-studied area, but also considers the outputs from elements further downstream in the industry supply chain—pipelines, refineries, and petrochemical operations—that are overlooked more often. As the report found, new petrochemical and refinery plants popping up all along the Gulf Coast are expected to produce the largest share of new emissions, 46 percent of the total half-billion tons. [...]
TOP COMMENTS
QUOTATION
“Now, when I say questioning the whole society, it means ultimately coming to see that the problem of racism, the problem of economic exploitation, and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated.” ~~Martin Luther King, Jr. (“Where Do We Go From Here,” (August 16, 1967)
TWEET OF THE DAY
BLAST FROM THE PAST
At Daily Kos on this date in 2004—Fasten Your Seatbelts …
Just two hours to go before Dubyanocchio lays his State of the Union No. 3 on us. If you’re wise, you’ll listen to that man rather than watch him because it’s better to throw a shoe and wreck your radio than it is to smash the television.
Despite the jobless recovery, despite that most Americans don’t feel safer from terrorism than they did two years ago, despite that 44 million Americans still don’t have health insurance, despite that the U.S. still doesn’t have a viable energy plan, despite the fact we still haven’t gotten the independent report on 9-11, despite that the investigators still haven’t told us who outed Valerie Plame, despite that 500 Americans (and literally uncounted numbers of Iraqis) have been killed in the continuing war in Iraq … despite, despite, despite—we’re going to hear from that man a lot of GOP triumphalism tonight. Saddam’s caught, Qaddafi’s yielded, et cetera, et cetera.
I’ll be tempted to violate my advice above and turn on the tube. Because I’d like to see how many Democrats (and how often) give that man more than pro forma applause.
I don’t mean to be too harsh. But there are times when I’d like to see them sitting on their hands. Frankly, I’d like to see them booing on occasion, but that’s too much to hope for even though this will be that man’s first campaign speech of 2004. Congressional Democrats should remember tonight that they are the Opposition party and that all the pomp and hoopla attending this formal affair is electioneering by that man on the taxpayers’ dime.
For those of you who would like to forget the beginning of that man’s speech by the time we reach the end, a couple of drinking games may help.
On
today’s Kagro in the Morning show:
It's Impeachfrastructure Week, again. Greg Dworkin takes us through the weekend evidence dumps, the legal filings, and what it all means, plus polling and primary news. Richmond's gun nut cosplay march kicks off. What's Parnas' game? Some speculation.
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