New study blows hole in “transition fuel” claim of fossil gas backers

The study found that, for Europe and China, importing US-produced LNG is worse for the climate than using local coal

For Europe and China, importing fossil gas from the United States to burn for power is worse for the climate than using local coal, because it produces about a third more emissions, a new study in Energy Science and Engineering has found.

While previous studies have relied on gas companies’ claims about how polluting their facilities are, the study by Cornell University’s Robert Howarth used independent measurements. His research concluded that planet-heating emissions from producing US gas are far higher than previously thought.

The findings undermine claims made by the gas industry, and some analysts and politicians in the US and elsewhere, that American exports of gas – in a liquid form known as LNG – can help decarbonise the rest of the world, serving as a “transition fuel” while countries shift to clean energy.

Howarth wrote in the study that “ending the use of LNG should be a global priority”. “I see no need for LNG as an interim energy source, and note that switching from coal to LNG requires massive infrastructure expenditures, for ships and liquefaction plants and the pipelines that supply them,” he said.

“A far better approach is to use financial resources to build a fossil-fuel-free future as rapidly as possible,” he added.

Destructive leaks

Some politicians and fossil gas producers have argued that gas can serve as a “transitional” or “bridge fuel” between coal and renewables. This approach rests on the fact that burning coal is more polluting for the climate than burning gas.

While Howarth confirmed this, he found that the carbon dioxide and methane emissions generated by extracting gas from shale, turning it into a liquid, shipping it across the world and turning it back into gas more than cancel out this benefit over coal.

The emissions from producing and transporting gas – not from burning it – are about three times as high as those for producing coal. This is because, whereas gravity keeps solids like coal on the ground, gas leaks into the atmosphere unless contained. What the industry has labelled “natural gas” is methane, a far more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide in the short term.

Images from satellites and special cameras show that gas regularly leaks from all steps of its journey from the ground to the power plant – from facilities like oil and gas wells, pipelines, ships, compressor stations and underground storage.

On top of this, for gas to be transported by ship, it has to be turned into liquid. This process is known as liquefaction and requires a lot of energy, which is usually produced by burning gas, worsening climate warming. The ships that transport the LNG around the world burn polluting fuel and also leak some of the gas they carry into the atmosphere.

US battles over LNG

In the US, shale gas has become a political hot topic over the last few years. US gas production has nearly doubled since 2010 and US gas producers want to build a series of LNG terminals to export it to Europe and Asia.

But in January 2024, influenced by Howarth’s earlier research, President Joe Biden announced a “temporary pause” on approvals of LNG exports to some countries. The administration’s announcement cited “an evolving understanding” of LNG and the “perilous impacts of methane on our planet”.

While climate campaigners celebrated, the gas industry and Republican politicians pushed back, with some making a climate case for gas as less polluting than other fossil fuels.

Shaylyn Hynes, spokeswoman for the project owner of the Calcasieu Pass 2 LNG terminal – which was affected by the pause – told the Washington Post that “well-funded environmental activists” are “completely out of touch with reality” and “are actually advocating for restricting access to a cleaner form of energy”.

Emily McClain, from the consultancy Rystad Energy, made a similar argument, claiming that “gas can absolutely displace coal in the medium term and long term, bringing carbon emissions down”. Hynes and Rystad did not respond to requests for comments for this article.

Sixteen Republican-controlled US states challenged the export pause and a federal judge, who was appointed by former Republican President Donald Trump, blocked it in July.

While Biden has made some moves to put the brakes on gas development, the administrations of both Trump and former Democratic President Barack Obama promoted gas. In 2014, while in the White House, Obama said that “if extracted safely, it’s the bridge fuel that can power our economy with less of the carbon pollution that causes climate change.”

In Europe, some politicians have promoted LNG import terminals in an effort to diversify gas supplies away from Russia. In January, the Eurogas trade association claimed that US LNG would help with the energy transition as well as energy security.

In February 2022, the European Commission endorsed gas as a “transition” fuel under its sustainable finance taxonomy, in a move climate campaigners called “the biggest greenwashing exercise of all time”.

Elsewhere, Japan has promoted LNG in Southeast Asia as part of a green “zero emission” initiative and, at last year’s COP28 climate summit in Dubai, Russia persuaded governments to endorse “transitional fuels”, a move one Caribbean negotiator called a “dangerous loophole”.

Cover photo: Liquified natural gas (LNG) facilities in Texas. Photo: Tim Aubry / Greenpeace