May 29, 2019 03:38 PM UTC

Freedom (Gas) isn't Free

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• by: PKolbenschlag

(Molecules of freedom! – Promoted by Colorado Pols)

In a bizarre literary crime, an official Department of Energy news release is touting exports of liquefied fracked gas (LNG) as “molecules of freedom.”

This super-cooled fossil fuel is one of several last ditch hopes for an over-leveraged fracked gas industry deep in over-supply, debt, and declining prices.

Of course, pushing our petroleum products to oversea users, shipping “Freedom Gas” to Asia and Europe, would not happen apart from the rest of the energy market, or be exempt from climate reality. Which is to say, Freedom Gas isn’t free.

Shipping fracked LNG to foreign markets will likely raise the cost for U.S. consumers. Back when markets mattered to conservatives, this is when they might remind us that such is just “Economics 101.”

Nor is fracked gas, and expanding fossil fuel infrastructure, and locking in twenty-year fracked gas contracts good for the climate, or even a good investment. Scientists mostly agree that we must act with unprecedented urgency to get off fossil fuels as quickly as possible. That any and all delay merely postpones and increases the cost and burden that will be paid.

In other words, with “Freedom Gas” Americans would pay more now AND pay more later. Which is to say the administration’s claim is just a bleat of hot air. And its a real stinker.