The future of natural gas

There are many pathways to decarbonize natural gas. Do we replace it, full stop? If so, with what? Should we blend natural gas with alternatives, or rip up the old infrastructure and replace it with something new? 

There’s a lot to unpack here. But there are also a lot of opportunities for innovators in the climatetech world. To dig into it, Shayle turns to Andy Lubershane, the senior vice president of research and strategy at Energy Impact Partners.

Andy and Shayle talk about the existential threat posed by natural gas: upstream methane emissions. 

And remember the utility death spiral? Andy argues that if solar and distributed energy resources continue to grow on their current trajectory, natural-gas infrastructure might actually be facing a death spiral of its own.

They also talk about renewable natural gas, capturing methane emissions, replacing gas with hydrogen and recovering solid carbon.

And where might natural gas stay strong? Andy says to keep an eye on distribution-level building heat. 

Catalyst is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

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