liquified natural gas

January 26, 2024

Biden hits the brakes on controversial gas export projects

By Shannon Kelleher

The Biden administration will temporarily pause pending applications for facilities that export natural gas, citing climate change considerations, the White House announced Friday.

The announcement, which comes after heavy pushback from environmental groups and affected communities along the Gulf, will put the brakes on eight new export terminals while the Department of Energy (DOE) reviews its approval process, including how to account for the impact of greenhouse gas emissions. The pause will not affect liquified natural gas (LNG) export terminals that are already operating.

“Today, we have an evolving understanding of the market need for LNG, the long-term supply of LNG, and the perilous impacts of methane on our planet,” said the White House in a statement. “We also must adequately guard against risks to the health of our communities, especially frontline communities in the United States who disproportionately shoulder the burden of pollution from new export facilities.”

“The pause, which is subject to exception for unanticipated and immediate national security emergencies, will provide the time to integrate these critical considerations,” the White House statement said.

LNG is made of methane, a potent contributor to climate change. While industry groups have called LNG “the cleanest of the fossil fuels,” new research from Cornell currently undergoing peer review suggests its total greenhouse gas emissions are higher than those from coal.

December 20, 2023

170 scientists urge Biden to reject huge proposed gas export project

By Shannon Kelleher

In the wake of the COP28 climate summit, 170 US scientists from the US and around the world sent a letter Tuesday calling for the Biden administration to reject a massive natural gas export facility proposed for Louisiana, as well as similar pending projects.

The facility, Calcasieu Pass 2 (CP2), would be the largest liquified natural gas (LNG) export terminal in the Gulf, spanning about 546 acres and shipping up to 24 million tons of LNG to other countries each year.

CP2 would be the second LNG export terminal built in the Gulf region by the company Venture Global and would result in annual emissions equivalent to 42 million gas-powered cars – 20 times more than the recently approved Willow oil project in Alaska.

“You have often said that your policies will be guided by listening to the science,” the letter says, addressing President Biden. “As scientists we are telling you in clear and unambiguous terms that approving CP2 and other LNG projects will undermine your stated goals of meaningfully addressing the climate crisis and put us on a continued path toward escalating climate chaos.”

The letter to President Biden follows a Dec. 11 letter from over 230 organizations that also implored President Biden and Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm to halt the project.

“I think what we’re seeing is the logical response to continued and repeated inaction from the Biden administration to meaningfully address any platform to phase out fossil fuels,” said Jim Walsh, policy director for the environmental group Food & Water Watch.

October 6, 2023

Puerto Rico’s natural gas buildout may harm those it claims to help

By Shannon Kelleher

Since 1999, Lissie Aviles, a Catholic nun, has lived in a convent in Cataño, Puerto Rico, a tiny town that borders the Bay of San Juan. The area is home to the world’s largest rum distillery, a Bacardi factory dubbed the “Cathedral of Rum.” Just across the bay, millions of tourists – many from the US mainland – flock to visit Old San Juan’s beaches and historical sites each year.

Cataño is known both as the smallest municipality on the island and as “the town that refused to die,” after it succeeded in fending off an early twentieth-century effort to merge the city with the inland community of Bayamón. The challenges for Cataño residents have persisted — after Hurricane Maria devastated the island in 2017, about 60% of Cataño residents were left homeless. Today, about 46% of the population lives below the poverty line in a US territory lacking full political representation and weighed down by a long legacy of colonization.

Aviles spends much of her time training faith educators in nearby parishes. But in recent years, her work has taken on an additional focus – defending local residents against harmful impacts tied to the island’s intensifying focus on expanding access to liquified natural gas (LNG).

The federal government has earmarked billions of dollars to help stabilize the island’s hurricane-rattled power system, including funding temporary generators powered by natural gas. Additionally, the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has approved a project to dredge the San Juan Bay beginning in January, allowing the nearby LNG terminal to receive ships carrying six times more LNG than current tankers. And one particularly contentious project is expanding with a new LNG pipeline.

While natural gas is considered the cleanest of fossil fuels because it produces less carbon dioxide than oil or coal, climate scientists say rising use of natural gas is emerging as one of the greatest contributors to human-caused climate change.

Though the stated aim of the LNG buildout is to ensure adequate resources to power the island, LNG imports are bringing methane leaks and diesel exhaust generated by the ships and trucks that transport the fuel, and posing risks associated with potentially explosive infrastructure, say Aviles and other critics. These dangers add to the cumulative risks of existing fossil fuel pipelines, tankers, and other infrastructure that already coexist uneasily with nearby neighborhoods. As they work to heal the wounds wrought by the 2017 hurricane and by Hurricane Fiona in 2022, many Catano residents fear the unintended consequences of an LNG boom.

September 22, 2023

Booming natural gas exports threatening Gulf Coast fishing communities

By Shannon Kelleher

Most mornings, Nathan Berwick rises well before dawn at his home in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, setting out on nearby Lake Charles in a small fishing boat to check his crab traps. If it’s not too hot and the water is calm, Berwick’s family occasionally joins him on the boat. His eleven-year-old daughter enjoys playing with baby crabs that fall from the traps as Berwick hauls them from the water.

Berwick comes from a long line of crabbers dating back to the 1820s, when his ancestors first arrived in the heel of the Louisiana boot – the state’s southwest corner.

“Thirty years from now I want my children to be able to say, ‘this is my home, this is where eight generations of Berwicks have lived,’” he said.

But this simple dream is in danger from a growing threat facing Berwick and others who contribute to – and depend on – the $1.5 billion fishing industry along Louisiana’s Gulf Coast.

The fossil fuel industry has identified the Gulf region as a key site for expanding liquified natural gas (LNG) export terminals. Eight new terminals are planned for southwest Louisiana alone, with a total of at least 16 new LNG projects anticipated for the Gulf region in coming years.

The terminals take in gas from transmission pipelines, cool it to a liquid, and store it for overseas exports. LNG is considered the cleanest of fossil fuels because it produces less carbon dioxide than coal and oil. And industry groups, including the Center for LNG, claim the fuel is vital to a clean energy future, with the potential to provide energy security and “lift people out of poverty.”

But environmental groups and concerned residents call the claims “greenwashing,” citing emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane and other air pollutants associated with LNG facilities, leakage, and emissions along its supply chain. They also point to a history of alleged shoddy operating practices that jeopardize public health and safety – all forced on communities with little consent.