But natural gas — once seen as a low-emitting fuel able to act as a stopgap until more renewable sources of energy could be developed — has been taking heat at this year's U.N.
“It’s the right time to clear the air on natural gas," said
"We as Canadians need to have a fuller view of the emissions profile of natural gas."
Canadian energy companies have long touted natural gas as a "cleaner" alternative, suggesting that projects like the massive LNG Canada export terminal currently under construction near
It's true that, when burned, natural gas produces far fewer carbon dioxide emissions than oil or coal. That means that in some cases, it has made sense for jurisdictions to move from a "worse" fossil fuel to a better one.
For example, by converting its coal-fired power plants to natural gas, the province of
But delegates at this year's climate summit are increasingly calling attention to the natural gas industry's role in the production of methane, a particularly potent greenhouse gas that leaks from natural gas pipelines and wells in the form of "fugitive emissions" or is released during the venting and flaring part of the natural gas extraction process.
Jeyakumar said if the world is serious about its goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050, then to drive greenhouse gas production down even further, the majority of electricity production going forward needs to be done through renewables.
“I think the risk with viewing (natural gas) as a bridge fuel is that it could lead one to build natural gas assets, and these assets have an economic life of several decades," she said.
"So what this does is lock us into these assets . . . and they become stranded assets.”
In Sharm el-Sheikh, both
But
"It really makes it a hopeless situation," Hughes said. "The amount of carbon capture and storage and so forth that you would need to do in order to meet your commitments would be huge."
"The minute you say you are going to decarbonize, you can demonize natural gas," McConaghy said in an interview. "But the cost of trying to do this has almost gone without consideration."
McConaghy said he believes a balanced approach that mitigates the worst effects of climate change while still strategically using natural gas to maximize human well-being is the answer.
"Because to completely eliminate the production and use of all hydrocarbons is, in my view, an extraordinarily extreme view and an extreme objective," he said.
According to the
With the climate policies that have been implemented by countries since, the IEA now says it expects the world will hit peak natural gas demand as early as the end of this decade, after which demand will begin to fall.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published
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