It has been a while since my last post. Here is some food for thought about natural gas:
- If you watched the State of the Union this past week, you probably noticed that President Obama talked quite a bit about energy. During that part of the speech he made the claim that there is 100 year supply of natural gas in the United States. This is unlikely to be the case, and an article on Treehugger - Fact-Checking Obama: Is There Really '100 Years' Worth of Natural Gas in the US? - debunks the premise.
- Even if it is true that we are sitting on 100 years of natural gas, consumers should not expect that the energy will be especially cheap or provide as many jobs as promised. As described in a New York Times article - Chesapeake to Cut Number of Gas Rigs - this week, natural gas drillers and refiners still face the same market incentives to cut production (and presumably labor hours) when prices get too cheap.
- It is difficult to tell what all of this may mean from a sustainability standpoint. Burning natural gas produces fewer greenhouse gas emissions than coal. However, if natural gas is used as an energy crutch, it may hinder a transition to a truly renewable and clean (no-emission) energy system.
- Extracting natural gas from shale through hydraulic fracturing (a.k.a. 'fracking') requires pumping chemicals into the ground, which may - despite the best efforts and claims of the industry - result in negative environmental consequences. Perhaps President Obama's plan to implement "rules to ensure that safe drilling practices are followed and the types of chemicals used in the so-called fracking method are disclosed for operations on public lands" will shed some light on the full extent of the potential consequences. [quote from: Jobs, energy, values top issues in Obama address by the Associated Press]
- According to an article in Bloomberg news - U.S. Cuts Estimate for Marcellus Shale Gas Reserves by 66%, the previous estimates of the available natural gas from shale have been revised. Using improved data the US DOE reduced its shale-based natural gas reserve estimates from last year by 42% for the country as a whole (66% for the Marcellus Shale formation). Thus, the natural gas from Marcellus shale is now expected to only cover 6 years of natural gas consumption (as opposed to the initial estimate of 17 years).
~Sean
