XPost: alt.global-warming, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, talk.politics.guns   
   XPost: sac.politics, sci.geo.petroleum, alt.crime   
   From: remailer@domain.invalid   
      
   The Biden administration’s plans for increased natural gas exports   
   are causing a revolt within the Democratic Party.   
      
   Despite the boom in renewables reducing domestic demand for fossil   
   fuels, the administration is backing the gas industry’s plans to   
   sell fuel at higher prices abroad, believing they will lead to less   
   production of climate-warming chemicals like carbon dioxide by   
   displacing dirtier-burning coal.   
      
   The fossil fuel industry is making a broader transition to gas,   
   which it is seeking to pitch as a climate-friendly fuel — and the   
   Biden administration has so far allowed it to more than double the   
   number of export facilities to ship gas abroad in its pressurized   
   and liquified form (LNG).   
      
      
   Democratic senators, led by Ed Markey (Mass.), have called on the   
   administration to stop investing in gas plants abroad, noting that   
   the administration has already spent $1.8 billion on overseas fossil   
   fuel plants this year alone, along with voting at the World Bank to   
   direct $400 million in new gas financing to poorer countries.   
      
   “The United States can’t preach temperance from a bar stool, and   
   right now, America is drunk on oil and gas production and exports,”   
   Markey wrote Wednesday.   
      
   In addition, 32 Democratic members of Congress urged the   
   administration in November to begin planning for the end of fossil   
   fuels.   
      
   At the United Nations climate conference (COP28) that concluded this   
   week, the administration unveiled a new plan to cut leaks from   
   methane production, the predominant component in gas, in an effort   
   to reduce one of the most serious sources of harmful pollution.   
      
   But in focusing only on leaks from transporting the fuel — something   
   the industry already has incentives to do — the Biden administration   
   is “ducking the hard issue” on climate change, Rep. Sean Casten (D-   
   Ill.) told The Hill.   
      
      
   Casten was one of 60 congressional Democrats who signed on to a   
   November letter demanding the Department of Energy (DOE) reassess   
   whether the new LNG terminals were in the national interest — a   
   condition required for new gas exports under the 1931 Natural Gas   
   Act.   
      
   Democrats like Casten argue that the elephant in the room is that   
   much of the surge in production isn’t intended to be used by   
   Americans. In 2022, the U.S. exported nearly 7 trillion cubic feet   
   of gas — a record sum and about 20 percent of total production,   
   according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The   
   administration expects those exports to increase to about 10   
   trillion cubic feet by 2050, driving rising domestic production —   
   even as domestic consumption falls.   
      
   “Is it in the U.S. national interest for us to decarbonize our   
   economy and continue ramping up fossil fuel production and export   
   overseas?” Casten told The Hill.   
      
   “I don’t think the DOE has even tried to answer that question,” he   
   said, though he added that such an expansion was “clearly in the   
   natural gas industry’s interest.”   
      
      
   Like the Obama administration — under which fossil fuel exports   
   became legal for the first time in half a century — the Biden   
   administration has been broadly bullish on gas. Last year, as oil   
   prices soared, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm called on the   
   nation’s oil companies to raise production.   
      
   And in April, even as the secretary emphasized the importance of   
   increasing renewable production fourfold, she also proclaimed   
   support for further gas exports.   
      
   “We want to be able to ensure that our allies can turn on the   
   lights,” she said. “We know that natural gas is available right now.   
   We have an abundance. So, we’re going to be a friend to our allies.”   
      
      
   In addition to national security, the Biden administration has   
   framed increased drilling for oil and gas and increased exports as   
   necessary measures to help the U.S. and allies get through the   
   period before renewables and electric vehicles can take over.   
      
   Defending the administration’s controversial approval of the Willow   
   project — a ConocoPhillips plan to produce oil for decades on   
   Alaska’s pristine North Slope — Granholm told Bloomberg, “We are   
   going through a managed transition,” and “we still have to allow   
   people to get from place to place affordably and turn on the   
   lights.”   
      
      
   While some research backs up the administration’s position, it is   
   highly controversial for both climatic and economic reasons.   
      
   First, while gas burns about twice as clean as coal, it still   
   releases planet-warming carbon dioxide — and it is a very potent   
   warming agent in its own right.   
      
   The gas that spills from the industry’s notoriously leaky supply   
   chain warms the planet dozens of times more than an equivalent   
   amount of carbon dioxide.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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