Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.   

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A new study by Case Western Reserve University says shale gas—fracking—is killing coal, not the EPA.

We are “all of the above” in our energy philosophy here are NaturalGasNOW. We do, though, favor natural gas for the obvious reasons. It is economical to produce, clean burning, stimulates rural development and offers urban consumers a tremendous energy bargain. Fracking, in combination with horizontal drilling, has produced a shale revolution, in fact. That revolution hasn’t been kind to coal and a new Case Western Reserve University documents this fact. It says the EPA isn’t nearly to blame for coal’s problems. It’s all about the low cost of fracking compared to the value obtained.

Finished well pad in West Virginia, where shale gas is replacing coal in many areas.

One of our loyal readers frequently sends me tips on interesting news in the world of fracking and its potential value to impoverished places such as Upstate New York. A couple of days ago he sent me a Science Daily link to the new study. It from the Great Lakes Energy Institute at Case Western Reserve and published in the Electricity Journal. Here is the very simple summary statement attached to the study:

Cheap shale gas produced by fracking has driven the decline in coal production in the United States during the last decade, researchers have found.

What the researchers found is this (emphasis added):

Power plants, which use 93 percent of the coal produced nationally, have been operating under the same EPA regulations signed into law by President George H.W. Bush in 1990. Proposed new rules since then have all been challenged in court and not implemented until June 2016, when the EPA’s restrictions on mercury and other toxic emissions were approved by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Consumption of coal continued to grow under those 1990-era EPA rules until 2008, and then went into steady decline, dropping by 23 percent from 2008 thru 2015.

The data show the drop in those years to be correlated with the shale revolution, as natural gas production increased by a factor of more than 10 and its price dropped in half, the researchers say. And, due to the continuing — and in some cases accelerating — technological and economic advantages of gas over coal, the decline in coal is expected to continue at least decades into the future…

“While we can’t say that the EPA rules have no impact — as, for example, discouraging the building of new coal power plants because of the expectation that tougher air-quality rules will clear the courts — the data say the EPA rules have not been the driving force.”

Hong, co-director of the Electricity Systems Research Lab at Case Western Reserve, and Walter Culver, a founding member of the Great Lakes Energy Institute Advisory Board at the university, say the data show that shale-gas competition is what’s been hurting coal as of today…

“If you’re a power plant operator and you see gas supply is continuing to increase and natural gas can do the job cheaper — by a lot — the decision to switch from coal is pretty easy,” Culver said.

“As we look toward the future, we see no natural mechanisms that will permit coal to recover,” Culver said.

Gas supply continues to grow. Starting in 2009, gas production each year has exceeded U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) annual projections. And the proved gas reserves are outpacing production exponentially, the researchers note. Lastly, pipelines out of Appalachia — where the cheapest and most abundant shale gas is found — are expected next year to increase access to gas in that region by 55 percent above recent production.

Natural gas is, as our reader explained in his note to me, a valuable bridge, if nothing else. This is because it is so much cleaner than coal. Combine this with the delay the anti’s have in getting utility scale solar and wind up and going and the case for such a bridge is undeniable. There’s no question there is an irreducible amount of gas that will be used in the Northeast US regardless of increased use of renewables, but even if one believes renewables are the “be all, end all,” natural gas (shale gas produced by fracking) is simply essential to get us there.

Fracking is, at the very least, a bridge to future. Photo by Andrey Savin

Coal’s future absent some “clean coal” miracle technology is bleak considering the miracle technology already embodied in fracking. The future of utility scale renewables will likewise require such a miracle. Natural gas is either the bridge from one thing to the other or it is the solution. The fact it has the advantage today of having been the first to market with a clean energy miracle technology is, of course, giving fractivists fits and inspiring their desperation tactic pipeline opposition. Renewables realists, though, will understandably welcome shale gas as that bridge.

Hat Tip: M.D.