Natural Gas: “Bridge Fuel” or “Fossil Fuel Trap”?
I first heard people referring to natural gas as a “bridge fuel” while researching methane emissions during high school in China. Before transitioning to a 100% renewable energy economy, it was said, we can use natural gas as a short-term solution to reduce our carbon footprint because natural gas combustion emits far fewer greenhouse gases than burning coal or oil. Especially for developing countries like China, a rapid energy transition is tough, so natural gas seems a preferable bridging solution. But in my first class at Duke – Energy Policy for a Changing World, I was also able to further explore the use of natural gas in developed nations. In the United States, natural gas has already become the largest source of electricity generation in the last decade, and 43.1% of domestic electricity generation last year was from natural gas.
As a Stanback Fellow at the Rachel Carson Council this summer, however, I started to reflect on my perception of this “bridge.” At a book signing event for Gaslight: The Atlantic Coast Pipeline and the Fight for America’s Energy Future, I first learned about the story of ordinary citizens fighting from 2014 to 2020 against a giant natural gas pipeline in Virginia.
According to the author, Jonathan Mingle, an independent writer and journalist focused on climate change, utilities have been falsely marketing their gas projects as “sustainable” – a behavior also known as “greenwashing” – to earn profits.
Instead of using it as a “bridge” to renewable energy, they have turned natural gas into a “fossil fuel trap.”
In addition, while working on researching offshore oil and gas drilling at the RCC I investigated offshore oil and gas drilling – another “trap” to achieve the energy transition. At the time, the Biden Administration had just delayed offshore oil and gas lease sales. Some argue that these delays would harm the U.S. national economy and security, yet I discovered that offshore drilling’s costs far outweigh its profits. These include direct costs like gas leaks and plugging abandoned wells plus indirect costs related to the climate crisis and health impacts. More importantly, the offshore oil and gas sector already has 11 million acres leased to them— three-quarters of which remain unused. I began to ask myself: why should we continue to lease new drilling sites while suffering so many negative environmental consequences?
Although natural gas is technically cleaner than coal, it still emits carbon into the air at a rate of approximately 117 lbs. of CO2 per MMBtu, and carbon capture projects can, with great expense, only capture a small percentage of the emissions. Above all, when looking at the entire life cycle of natural gas (from production to combustion), it leaks lots of methane – a greenhouse gas that is 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide and is oftentimes overlooked. The natural gas pipelines in the Permian Basin, for example, release 14 times more methane than the inventory estimates, which is enough to power 2 million homes. Similarly, the 2022 Nord Stream pipeline explosion in the Baltic Sea released up to half a million tons of methane – the largest natural gas leak ever recorded.
Using the silver bullet named “bridge fuel,” large utilities prioritize their profits over decarbonization and continue to construct new gas plants. The global oil and gas sector’s profits in 2022 rose to $4 trillion from an average of $1.5 trillion in the past. A gas plant built today can remain in operation to 2050 and beyond, which means that as every year goes by, the expected lifetime of a newly-built plant extends even more beyond 2050.
When we call natural gas a “bridge fuel,” we should also ask: how long is the bridge?
Can we make use of natural gas without turning it into a long-term problem? Long-term planning is necessary to achieve a net-zero emissions economy by 2050. For now, it is imperative to start taking near-term actions. According to the AR6 Synthesis Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, “deep, rapid and sustained mitigation and accelerated implementation of adaptation actions in this decade would reduce projected losses and damage” and “delayed mitigation and adaptation action would lock-in high emissions infrastructure.” That means we need to get off natural gas as soon as possible. Delays mean we will be stuck with dangerous and leaky old pipes and other infrastructure.
A direct transition to renewables may not be immediately possible now — not all energy sources are interchangeable: aircraft, shipping, and the hard-to-abate industrial sectors still rely heavily on fossil fuels given the technologies we currently have. Moreover, natural gas is an important backup option in renewable-based power systems. But even this is because of the intermittency of solar and wind energy and the undeveloped energy storage technologies that we currently have.
While transitioning away from natural gas may be difficult, we can gradually phase it out it by developing explicit long-range plans for the energy transition to renewables. Currently, both state and federal regulators make decisions that affect our reliance on natural gas without having a clear view of the big picture. With a long-term plan in mind, they can make more informed decisions to prevent natural gas from being a “fossil fuel trap.” Any transition planning should consider the following steps:
- Policymakers should first quantify current gas use and understand the trends based on scientific research;
- Develop different policy scenarios — each with a final date beyond which no new gas plants can be approved. Each plan needs to have valid data and deadlines. Given their resources, different states could follow different scenarios.
- Mitigate the risks from natural gas before achieving a direct transition. Set nuanced and specific methane reduction targets and improve emissions detection technologies;
- Explore alternatives to replace natural gas as a backup energy in renewable-based power systems. Solutions that can improve grid stability include promoting energy storage technologies, renewable hydrogen, heating and cooling storage, low-impact off-river pumped-storage hydropower, and smart grids coupled with demand-response measures.
So. Is natural gas a “bridge fuel” or a “fossil fuel trap”? It’s hard to answer this without detailed plans and timelines for the energy transition to fully renewable energy. But surely natural gas must be only a temporary expedient. We should be far more cautious about this source of methane – an explosive and powerful contributor to global climate change. We need a far greater sense of urgency to prevent natural gas from becoming a “fossil fuel trap.”
RCC Stanback Fellow – Maria Ding
Maria Ding is a sophomore at Duke University majoring in Financial Economics with an Energy & Environment Certificate. Passionate about energy, she aspires to promote energy transition for the world. Maria is now the Associate Director of Special Programming at the Duke Energy & Climate Club, where she helps committed young people better explore their interests in energy.
