“Study after study has indicated that most offsets available on the market don’t reliably reduce emissions, and yet offsets are now the backbone of the environmental policies of many of the biggest polluters on the planet.”
“So when Northwest Natural uses healthy, happy, nature-loving actors to sell us fracked gas, think about the doctors who used to sell us cigarettes on TV.”
You can’t decarbonize natural gas. Fossil gas is part of the climate problem…never the answer.
The Green New Deal seemingly came out of the blue to become a litmus test for 2020 presidential hopefuls. But it didn't happen by accident. Alongside multiple members of Congress—notably Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey—a group of young activists — The Sunrise Movement — pushed the plan into the headlines, working behind the scenes to reshape America's approach to the climate crisis.
Dar-Lon Chang, an ex-Exxon PhD mechanical engineer speaks out.
“The fact that natural gas was much cleaner burning than coal, that it produced half the carbon dioxide emissions of coal, those were very appealing to me”.
But there was a problem. Chang knew the methane in natural gas had the potential to do significant damage if allowed to leak. “Natural gas…primarily methane…when it’s leaked out to the atmosphere, can have orders of magnitude more global-warming impact than carbon dioxide.”
.As leading climate scientists issue new warnings about climate change, Part Three examines how the fossil fuel industry worked to delay the transition to renewable energy sources — including by promoting natural gas as a cleaner alternative.
Part Two of this three-part series explores the industry’s efforts to stall climate policy, even as evidence about climate change grew more certain in the new millennium.
FRONTLINE examines the fossil fuel industry’s history of casting doubt and delaying action on climate change. Part One of this three-part series charts the fossil fuel industry's early research on climate change and investigates industry efforts to sow seeds of doubt about the science.