Natural Gas Emissions
A new study published online this week in Nature finds that more abundant supplies of lower-cost natural gas in the future would not only displace higher-emitting coal but would also displace lower-emitting renewable and nuclear technologies. It concluded that without additional policies “emissions of heat-trapping gases … would not decline worldwide and could possibly go up” with increased use of natural gas.
RFF’s Brian Flannery, who co-authored the study with an international team of researchers, explains that while many hoped “that the recent US natural gas boom could help slow climate change,” it appears not to be the case. However, he notes that the recent shale gas boom has resulted in various “benefits related to the economy, jobs, energy security, and local air pollution,” which should not be ignored.
Renewable Energy in EPA’s Clean Power Plan
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) recently published a report suggesting that EPA’s proposed Clean Power Plan “could deliver much deeper reductions in emissions” by including more opportunities to take advantage of renewable energy. It recommends a number of alterations to the plan that UCS says would “nearly double the amount of cost-effective renewable energy in [its] state targets.”
As part of RFF’s Expert Forum on the EPA’s Clean Power Plan, UCS Senior Energy Analyst Jeremy Richardson weighs in on EPA’s assumptions about the deployment of renewable energy in its proposal. Richardson describes six ways EPA could strengthen its renewables-based building block, including “factoring in renewable energy growth between 2012 and 2017” and “removing (or relaxing) artificial limits on growth rates.” Experts from the Environmental Defense Fund and Pacific Gas & Electric also provide their views on this issue in RFF’s forum.
