Geology Reference
In-Depth Information
per MBTU, a carbon tax may be required to ensure that gas maintains its edge over
coal. Similarly, should gas prices drop below $8.3 per MBTU, the PTC or similar
initiatives might be required to support wind and solar energy.
If we are to achieve a low-carbon future, the Harvard researchers write, then gas
prices must remain low enough to marginalize coal but not so low that renewable
energy is rendered uncompetitive.
In a few short years, hydrofracking has fundamentally changed the energy land-
scape—for better or for worse. It has given us access to vast and previously in-
accessible sources of natural gas and oil, provided jobs, stimulated the economy,
lowered greenhouse gas emissions, altered the global marketplace, and changed
policy. It is equally true that it adds methane to the air, pollutes water, dredges up
toxic and radioactive substances, and has on occasion negatively impacted human
and environmental health. As the hydrofracking boom widens, people are increas-
ingly forced to weigh the benefits of shale resources against the costs of providing
them.
To assess the pros and cons of hydrofracking, shale gas should be evaluated in
the context of other readily available energy sources, especially coal. Coal is cheap
and plentiful, but burning it emits twice the carbon dioxide per unit of energy as
shale gas does and produces toxic metals, such as mercury, and other pollutants.
Moreover, coal mining is more dangerous and environmentally destructive than hy-
drofracking for shale gas.
Based on what is known at this point, the shale gas delivered by hydrofracking
is, on balance, better for the environment than coal. In the second decade of the
twenty-first century, the United States is supplanting coal with natural gas. But
Europe, China, and India are increasingly reliant on coal. Those nations have only
just begun to investigate hydrofracking, and conditions there will make it more dif-
ficult to expand the use of shale gas as quickly as the United States is doing.
In America shale gas was seen as an overnight sensation, but in reality it took
decades of research, testing, false starts, and tentative steps before it unlocked a
new energy supply. For its part, Europe could take a decade or longer before it be-
gins to use hydrofracking in earnest, if it ever does. There are many opportunities
and pitfalls still to come.
