Sarah Palin Was Right #17: Reihan Salam on Domestic Natural Gas

Reihan Salam, co-author of Grand New Party, says in a Forbes opinion piece that natural gas is the bridge fuel we need to get us from our coal-fired past to an "all of the above"-powered future:

While environmentalists are keen to fight climate change by reducing carbon emissions, rank-and-file voters seem more taken by the promise of energy independence. Last year, Republicans energized the conservative base by promising to "drill here, drill now," a rallying cry that promised to exploit domestic energy reserves to reduce America's reliance on foreign oil. Energy experts insisted, however, that because oil is a global commodity, exploiting offshore oil would have a trivial impact on our exposure to geopolitical instability in the biggest oil-producing regions. Chaos in the Persian Gulf and the strife-torn Nigerian delta would continue to impact prices at the pump. In a tightly integrated global economy, energy independence might be impossible to achieve. But by sharply increasing our use of natural gas and nuclear power, we might be able to come close while also reducing the carbon intensity of the American economy.

The last few months have seen a surge in interest in natural gas, the cleanest fossil fuel. American engineers and geologists have pioneered new, more effective ways of extracting natural gas from shale formations, and recoverable reserves in the United States have gone up by an extraordinary 40% in just the last four years.

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Among advocates of nuclear power--and I very much count myself among them--there is a not-so-subtle resentment of natural gas, which gets tremendous credit for emitting half as much carbon as coal while nukes generate zero carbon. This is a subject I intend to revisit. For now, I'll just say that while low-cost small nuclear reactors might prove to be the most attractive solution to our climate woes and a promising new source of manufacturing jobs, natural gas strikes me as a reliable bridge between the coal-intensive present and the nuclear-intensive future.

In a recent op-ed for National Review, former Governor Sarah Palin wrote:

Natural gas is one promising clean alternative. It contains fewer pollutants than other fossil fuels, it’s easier to collect and process, and it is found throughout our country. In Alaska, we’re developing the largest private-sector energy project in history — a 3,000-mile, $40 billion pipeline to transport hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of natural gas to markets across the United States. Onshore and offshore natural gas from Alaska and the Lower 48 can satisfy a large part of our energy needs for decades, bringing us closer to energy independence. Whether we use it to power natural-gas cars or to run natural-gas power plants that charge electric cars — or ideally for both — natural gas can act as a clean “bridge fuel” to a future when more renewable sources are available.

Salam and Palin are right, of course. Natural gas burns cleaner in power plants than coal, and it burns cleaner in vehicles than gasoline and diesel. If we are to have a diversified energy future which relies primarily on nuclear and renewables, the cleanest and most secure way to get there is fueled by natural gas, a domestic energy resource which America has in abundance.

- JP