Talk about the hyper-local effects of fossil fuels: Gas leaks kill trees, create ozone, and — you may want to sit down before reading this — brown your lawn*:
On the ground level, natural gas, which is roughly 95 percent methane, creates thick, toxic ozone that leads to respiratory problems such as asthma, especially in children and the elderly, and strangles plant life around it. Roadside trees, often called “shade trees,” fall victim to gas leaks. They die slowly over time as they absorb the gas through channels designed for oxygen. The roots suffocate.
Gas companies call the leaks “lost and unaccounted for gas.” It’s just figured into the rate formula. Roughly 2.7 percent of gas is lost every year, according to Phillips’ research.
On a climate level, the leaks alone make up an estimated 10 percent of Massachusetts’ greenhouse gas inventory. That’s as much as all the factories in the state, said Audrey Schulman, a utilities consultant turned activist and president of Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET) – “and it’s a lot easier to fix the leaks than stop the factories,” she said. [emphasis ed.]
(It’s a really great article — read the whole thing. It features friends-of-the-blog Rep. Lori Ehrlich, Sen. Jamie Eldridge and Joel Wool. Kudos to reporter Bill Shanner for fine work.)
For background on methane and ground level gases, let’s ask NASA (2005 article):
According to new calculations, methane’s effect on warming the world’s climate may be double what is currently thought. The new interpretations reveal methane emissions may account for a whopping third of the climate warming from well-mixed greenhouse gases between the 1750s and today. The IPCC report states that methane increases in our atmosphere account for only about one sixth of the total effect of well-mixed greenhouse gases on warming.
Part of the reason the new calculations give a larger effect is that they include the effect methane has on air pollution. A major component of air pollution is near-surface-level or tropospheric ozone, which is not directly emitted, but is instead formed chemically from methane other hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides. The IPCC report includes the effects of tropospheric ozone increases on climate, but it is not attributed to particular sources. By categorizing the climate effects according to emissions, Shindell and colleagues found the total effects of methane emissions are substantially larger. In other words, the true source of some of the warming that is normally attributed to smog is really due to methane that leads to increased smog.
Oh, that sounds good.
As we know, Boston leaks a stunning amount of gas — a rate at which natural gas’s supposed greenhouse effect advantage over coal is essentially zero — contra ads by industry groups
And again: We’ve got two companies literally coming into your backyards wanting to build gigantic new pipelines with capacity they haven’t sold, paid for by ratepayers, selling a massively harmful product that is freely spewing out the other end.
This is dumb.
And our Governor supports them. Maybe he still isn’t smart enough.
*(One is reminded of Andy Borowitz’s riff: “AMERICANS STARTING TO WORRY ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE NOW THAT IT AFFECTS THEIR LAWNS“)
by announcing sweeping pollution reductions at a 2:15 press conference today via his Clean Power Plan.
Fred Rich LaRiccia
Founder P.O.W.A.R.
While Obama’s plan does incent increases in renewable energy, a major part of its thrust is replacing coal and oil power generation with gas. I can see no mention in any of the accounts of his plan of its addressing gas leakage. So, WRT the subject of this post, your comment is irrelevant.
We’ve been visited by a company or two recently. Smooth talkers for sure. Charming. Full of diversionary phrases like “This will create jobs” and “we’ll return your property back to it’s present condition” (sure, but how do you replace 50 year old trees?)
At first, we gave them permission to survey but after the lies, we retracted that permission and as of Saturday, have received three mailing asking for permission and one personal visit, which was rather uncomfortable as I had to tell the young man to kindly leave and ask him why, after we sent a letter asking representatives to stop entering our property, was he entering our property?
These people are not going to give up.
“According to new calculations, methane’s effect on warming the world’s climate may be double what is currently thought.”
Charlie Baker opposes making the companies clean up their own mess.
And the costs get pushed onto everyone else.
Nobody wastes taxpayer money like Republicans.
About 7 years ago, the Town of Brookline ripped up every tree on my side of the block. They’d been compromised by the exact condition charley has posted about. The trees got buggy and brittle an started fall over whenever we got a stiff wind. In the course of a few days we went from being a shady lane to a bit of a stark landscape.
One of the big issues no pol in MA has really tackled is the fairly decrepit state of our gas lines, sewer lines, water lines and overhead electric lines. We are reliant on way too much ancient and unreliable infrastructure. Tackling it in piecemeal fashion at the local level only marches us farther down the primrose path. I’ve got to believe patching shoddy infrastructure ultimately costs us more than replacing it.