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WHEELING – While coal industry officials ponder how to cope with the Clean Power Plan’s mandatory 32 percent reductions by the year 2030 for CO2 pollution, oil and natural gas companies must now find a way to mitigate 45 percent of methane emissions by 2025.
The recent announcement of new regulations, however, was met with praise from environmental groups such as the Sierra Club.
“Continued reliance on dirty fossil fuels is a dangerous course for our communities and our climate. We must move swiftly to truly clean energy like wind, solar and energy efficiency while establishing policies that keep fossil fuels in the ground,” Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said last week upon the Environmental Protection Agency’s unveiling of the methane regulations.
“We’re encouraged that the Obama administration is beginning to ask the oil and gas industry to bear the burden of its pollution. These rules pave the way for the administration to move swiftly to curb emissions from existing sources,” Brune added.
Robert E. Murray, chairman and CEO of Murray Energy Corp., often has criticized the relationship some natural gas companies had with environmental groups that attacked coal. He is not surprised to see the EPA now also target oil and natural gas drillers.
“There is no question that President Barack H. Obama, his Democrat supporters and his appointed bureaucrats want to eliminate the use of all fossil fuels. We have maintained that, while the Obama administration has targeted the use of coal for first destruction and termination, natural gas interests, who have often supported the Obama administration’s anti-coal policies, would be next for elimination,” Murray said.
“What is happening here is the destruction of available, reliable and affordable electricity in America,” he added.
Attack on Coal
The Energy Information Administration expects coal-fired power plant closures to reach 90 gigawatts by 2020 under the EPA’s rule. That is approximately enough generation capacity to deliver reliable power to about 73 million Americans.
According to the White House, the Clean Power Plan will save an average American family nearly $85 on an annual energy bill by 2030, while saving consumers a total of $155 billion from 2020-2030. However, these cost reductions will almost surely go to states which voted overwhelmingly in Obama’s favor during both the 2008 and 2012 elections – such as California, Connecticut and New York – at the expense of those who solidly opposed him in states such as West Virginia and Kentucky.
The assault on coal-fired electricity seems very likely to continue. On its website, the Sierra Club showcases a map of coal-fired power plants across the U.S. On the “Beyond Coal” campaign page, the group features green pins on the plants it considers “defeated,” while also noting others still in its crosshairs.
“In just five years the Beyond Coal campaign has helped retire or transition to cleaner energy nearly 40 percent of American’s coal plants, preventing 6,000 heart attacks, 60,000 asthma attacks and 3,600 deaths each year,” Bruce Nilles, Beyond Coal senior campaign director, said.
Last week, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation granted $15 million more to the campaign to in an effort to close more coal plants. MacArthur’s grant is in addition to support for the club’s anti-coal campaign from other donors, including the $80 million pledged by Bloomberg Philanthropies.
“Global climate disruption will have a profoundly negative impact on how humans live and work. That’s why we need effective international leadership and cooperation that bring about sufficient and measurable results,” MacArthur Foundation President Julia Stasch said.
Attack on Natural Gas
Recently, the EPA determined fracking did not create “widespread” water problems. However, the restrictions on methane – a greenhouse gas rated at 25 times more potent at trapping heat in the atmosphere than CO2 – unnecessary.
“As I understand things, the industry has already cut methane emissions in recent years, and emissions are declining. Unless you live under a rock, it is clear that we have an abundant supply of inexpensive, clean natural gas. Most of the recent studies have indicated that methane emissions are not significant and certainly not a problem,” R. Dennis Xander, past president of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of West Virginia, said.
“We hear 45 percent today. What if that can be achieved? Will the administration raise the bar again?” Xander added.
The Heartland Institute is a 31-year-old free-market think tank based in Chicago. Heartland research fellow Isaac Orr said the specifics of the plan remain unclear.
“If this rule were such a slam dunk for the climate, why hasn’t the administration told the public how much potential future warming would be mitigated by these regulations?” he said. “The fact of the matter is, these regulations will drive up costs for consumers and energy producers, but yield no tangible climate benefit.”
“While methane is indeed a greenhouse gas, it has no measurable impact on Earth’s temperature regardless of its capacity to capture a great deal more heat than carbon dioxide because of its insignificant quantity in the scheme of things,” Heartland Science Director Jay Lehr said.