For the record, I am not now, nor have I ever been, an oil and natural gas abolitionist.
We will have to continue extracting oil and natural gas for centuries, possibly millennia. We need hydrocarbons for the components of modern life: pharmaceuticals, building materials, chemicals and lubricants.
We also need petroleum products for wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles, power generation and electricity transmission. Look around and you’ll see hundreds, if not thousands, of things made from oil and natural gas.
We will be drilling holes in the ground to extract crude oil and natural gas for a long time; to suggest otherwise is silly. But we’ll be drilling a lot less in the coming decades, and here’s the problem.
Climate change is the most important challenge facing the world today. The more carbon dioxide we release into the atmosphere, the more heat the earth retains. The simplest way to mitigate climate change is to burn less oil and natural gas.
Hydrocarbons are not the problem; burning them is
Some readers think a Texas business columnist should cheer on the state’s biggest industry. But I stress climate change because oil and gas are the biggest contributors to the Texas economy. Our state is also the largest carbon emitter in the country.
Our customers, however. they are looking for alternatives to oil and gas. Texans may deny that climate change is happening, but the rest of the world doesn’t care what we think.
Smart business owners track consumer preferences and constantly change their product offerings. Energy business Texans need to do the same.
Most governments have announced plans to reduce emissions enough to slow global warming and limit the average temperature increase to 2 degrees Celsius. The reduction in emissions will necessarily imply a lower demand for oil and gas.
Natural gas is another story. Many producers present gas as a bridge fuel, able to quickly and economically replace coal-fired boilers and provide reliable electricity generation. Natural gas can also cover many industrial heating needs. If the world were to replace all coal-fired power plants with natural gas, we would make a massive leap toward our emissions reduction goals.
The IEA, however, says that we will eventually need to double our reliance on wind and solar power and halve our use of natural gas for electricity to meet international targets. The world will need a lot less gas if that happens.
Texas businesses must adapt.
New technologies can make a difference. The world’s largest oil and gas companies are looking for ways to reduce emissions or recover the carbon released by combustion.
The Houston Energy Transition Initiative brings together dozens of companies to convert natural gas into clean-burning hydrogen and to sequester carbon dioxide under the Gulf of Mexico.
None of these systems are proven or cheap. Critics also worry about oil and gas production leaks that could negate the technologies’ benefits. But I don’t see anything wrong with companies trying to innovate and potentially offer new paths.
Our priority, however, must be to prevent climate change for future generations. Protecting a polluting industry, preserving jobs or guaranteeing profitability for shareholders must be secondary.
Chris Tomlinson, named 2021 Texas Managing Editors Columnist of the Year, writes commentary on money, politics and life in Texas. Sign up for his “Tomlinson’s Take” newsletter at HoustonChronicle.com/TomlinsonNewsletter or Expressnews.com/TomlinsonNewsletter.
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ctomlinson@hearstcorp.com
