{"id":2418,"date":"2011-11-28T08:00:33","date_gmt":"2011-11-28T14:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=2418"},"modified":"2013-11-15T20:38:54","modified_gmt":"2013-11-16T02:38:54","slug":"abundant-natural-gas-spells-trouble-for-renewables","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/11\/28\/abundant-natural-gas-spells-trouble-for-renewables\/","title":{"rendered":"How Abundant Natural Gas Spells Trouble for Renewables"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/natural-gas.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright size-large wp-image-2448\" title=\"natural gas\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/natural-gas-620x343.jpg\" width=\"620\" height=\"343\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/natural-gas-620x343.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/natural-gas-300x166.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/natural-gas-220x122.jpg 220w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A few years ago, when US natural gas production was kicking into high gear, gas promoters like T. Boone Pickens sold it as something close to a panacea. It was a plentiful source of energy that could create jobs at home. It could wean the US off of foreign oil. Perhaps most importantly, it was a \u201cbridge fuel\u201d &#8212; it could serve as a cleaner source of electricity while America\u2019s renewable energy industry came into its own.<\/p>\n\n<p>It\u2019s hard to conceive just how fast the industry has grown since then. In 2010, the US surpassed Russia as the world leader in gas production on the strength of domestic shale reserves. Estimates show production more than doubling by 2020 to over 40 billion cubic feet of gas produced per day. This success can be viewed as a vindication of early gas investors. But abundant and cheap natural gas has also brought its own set of challenges.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201cNatural gas is absolutely a victim of our own success,\u201d Adam Haynes, director of Corporate Development for Chesapeake Energy, told StateImpact Texas. He says natural gas has become so prevalent that fewer people are putting their money into it.\u00a0\u201cRight now, because the price of natural gas is so low, producers are chasing the oil and natural gas liquids window,\u201d Haynes said.<\/p>\n<p><div class=\"related-content alignright\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/11\/11\/does-the-keystone-pipeline-delay-actually-hurt-green-energy\/\">Does the Keystone Pipeline Delay Actually Hurt Green Energy?<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/11\/16\/as-drilling-grows-is-enforcement-shrinking\/\">As Drilling Grows, Is Enforcement Shrinking?<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/11\/22\/railroad-commission-punts-on-fracking-disclosure-rules\/\">Texas Railroad Commission Punts on Fracking Disclosure Rules<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><img class=\"alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/07\/Hydraulic-FrackingBarnettShaleDrilling-60x60.jpg\" height=\"60\" width=\"60\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/topic\/hydraulic-fracturing-2\/\">Everything You Need To Know About Hydraulic Fracturing<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>In places like the Eagle Ford shale formation in South Texas he says Chesapeake uses the same\u00a0hydraulic\u00a0fracturing (&#8220;fracking&#8221;)\u00a0techniques that extract gas to extract oil and liquid gas. That\u2019s a best-case scenario for companies, though no comfort to environmentalists concerned with the impact of fracking.<\/p>\n<p>The worst-case scenario from a business perspective is if a driller is holding a lease on land to drill gas that it no longer wants.\u00a0\u201cIn [gas companies\u2019] lease obligations, they have drilling obligations, and they have, if they find something, production obligations,\u201d said Chip Groat, director of UT\u2019s Austin\u2019s Center for International Energy and Environmental Policy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo they really have to keep up a certain amount of drilling to hold the leases. And they aren\u2019t quite willing to give them up yet. So it\u2019s a really interesting position for companies to be in, where they don\u2019t really need more gas, but they don\u2019t really want to let go what they\u2019ve already paid for,\u201d Groat said.<br \/>\nBut the real challenges in a world of cheap and plentiful natural gas are found outside the fossil fuel industry. Since it&#8217;s such an inexpensive energy source now, Groat wonders if gas has gone from being a bridge to renewables and become a barrier instead.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a suspicion backed up by some of renewable energy\u2019s greatest proponents.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe low price of natural gas has an automatic negative impact on the development of renewable energy sources. And people in leadership positions know that,\u201d said Russel Smith, the Executive Director of the Texas Renewable Energy Industries Association.<\/p>\n<p>Smith says the state of Texas may want to look into regulating how much gas can be drilled in order to control prices. Other proposals include boosting exports and finding new markets for gas domestically.<\/p>\n<p>In support of that last idea the so-called \u201cNat Gas Act\u201d &#8212; a bill to give incentives to trucking businesses that use natural gas powered vehicles &#8212; was introduced in the US Senate this month.<br \/>\nWhile the fate of that is yet to be determined, one thing\u2019s for sure, according to Chesapeake Energy\u2019s Adam Haynes. There\u2019s plenty of gas to meet future needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few years ago, when US natural gas production was kicking into high gear, gas promoters like T. Boone Pickens sold it as something close to a panacea. It was a plentiful source of energy that could create jobs at home. It could wean the US off of foreign oil. Perhaps most importantly, it was [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":2437,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[59],"tags":[74,15,22,145,24],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2418"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2418"}],"version-history":[{"count":35,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2418\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32708,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2418\/revisions\/32708"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}