HOUSTON — A decade ago, natural gas was heralded as the fuel of the future. In shale fields across the country, hydraulic fracturing uncorked a lucrative new source of supply. Energy giants like Exxon Mobil and Chevron snapped up smaller companies to get in on the action, and investors poured billions of dollars into export […]
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WASHINGTON — Emissions of planet-warming carbon dioxide from fossil fuels hit a record high in 2019, researchers said Tuesday, putting countries farther off course from their goal of halting global warming. The new data contained glimmers of good news: Worldwide, industrial emissions are on track to rise 0.6 percent this year, a considerably slower pace than […]
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For months, the utility that provides gas to Long Island and parts of New York City refused to activate gas hookups for both new and returning customers, casting some real estate developments into limbo. The utility’s moratorium triggered a political standoff that intensified this month, when Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo issued a threat: either the […]
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As the world warms and weather grows more extreme, it’s hard to find anyone in American politics—Democrat or Republican—taking the crisis as seriously as scientists suggest they should. A report released this week by the United Nations Environment Programme found that by 2030, the world’s states will have produced twice the amount of fossil fuels […]
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In a Manhattan neighborhood filled with shops, restaurants and luxury housing, Maria Hrynenko saw an opportunity to expand her family’s real estate empire. But, prosecutors said, she cut corners to do so and the consequences proved deadly: In March 2015, a gas explosion leveled half of an East Village block, killing two young men at […]
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Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and a utility that provides gas to New York City and Long Island have been locked in a standoff since May, when New York regulators blocked the construction of a $1 billion natural gas pipeline that would have run from Pennsylvania to New Jersey and New York. The utility, National Grid, […]
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NEW ORLEANS — Susan Guidry stepped up as a volunteer in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, helping clear debris from the streets as part of a group calling itself the Katrina Krewe. She saw firsthand the disaster’s toll, including the crippling of the power supply. When voters elected her to the City Council, she said, […]
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GRONINGEN, the Netherlands — Driving through fields of low-lying Dutch farmland you pass an occasional odd cluster of silvery pipes and tanks. They are the only visible sign that deep below this northeast corner of the Netherlands is one of the world’s largest natural gas fields. Unless you stop by one of the nearby farmhouses […]
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Want climate news in your inbox? Sign up here for Climate Fwd:, our email newsletter. When leaders from Exxon Mobil and BP gathered last month with other fossil-fuel executives to declare they were serious about climate change, they cited progress in curbing an energy-wasting practice called flaring — the intentional burning of natural gas as […]
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WASHINGTON — When Energy Secretary Rick Perry led an American delegation to the inauguration of Ukraine’s new president in May, he took the opportunity to suggest the names of Americans the new Ukrainian government might want to advise and oversee the country’s state-owned gas company. Mr. Perry’s focus during the trip on Ukraine’s energy industry […]
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Coastal Louisiana parishes announced on Thursday that they had reached a deal with a mining company over claims that its aggressive drilling for oil damaged the state’s vanishing coast, a settlement that could lead to other agreements with energy giants as the state scrambles to stop its disastrous land loss. In a tentative agreement with […]
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From the deck of a boat in New York harbor, the chief executive of Equinor squinted toward a stretch of sea where his oil company will soon build a giant wind farm. “We are doing all we can” to fight climate change, said the executive, Eldar Saetre. Hours later, at a hotel where Mr. Saetre […]
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As young climate activists, frightened for their futures, meet with world leaders at the United Nations Climate Action Summit on Monday, oil and gas industry executives are conferring to grapple with the stark, existential choice their industry faces. As they attended a cocktail reception at the Gramercy Park Hotel Sunday, several dozen climate protesters gathered […]
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HOUSTON — The drone attack on one of Saudi Arabia’s most important oil facilities could cripple a portion of Saudi petroleum exports for days or even weeks and send energy prices higher. But experts say that a severe shock to energy markets and the world economy is unlikely. The attack on the Abqaiq processing facility, […]
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HOUSTON — Oil and gas producers might have been expected to welcome a decision to loosen regulations affecting their business. But their reaction to the Trump administration’s move to roll back methane-emissions rules revealed at least tactical divisions on climate policy. Contradictory voices quickly emerged Thursday between those who supported the move as a boon […]
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MONACA, Pa. — President Trump’s appearance on Tuesday at the site of a multibillion-dollar chemical plant under construction here was ostensibly about energy policy. Instead, the crowd of mostly white, male workers in bright orange and yellow construction vests was the audience for a 67-minute speech that was nearly indistinguishable from something that Mr. Trump […]
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If an artist were to choose colors for portraits of public officials to represent their records on climate change, one color would suffice for Donald Trump: charcoal black. How better to capture the president’s efforts to increase the extraction of coal, oil and gas at a time when emissions from these fuels are likely to […]
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Methane emissions from five major US cities are twice what we previously thought and contributing to climate change, a new study shows. According to a paper by researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the University of Michigan that was recently published in Geophysical Research Letters, leaky pipes are likely sending gas […]
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In October 2015, a fragile well casing ruptured at the Aliso Canyon natural gas storage field in Los Angeles, California—and no one could figure out how to stop it. For 118 days, 100,000 metric tons of methane and other hazardous pollutants seeped into the atmosphere. The worst single natural gas leak in American history was […]
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TEL AVIV — For decades, Israel was an energy-starved country surrounded by hostile, oil-rich neighbors. Now it has a different problem. Thanks to major offshore discoveries over the last decade, it has more natural gas than it can use or readily export. Having plenty of gas is hardly a burden, and it offers a cleaner-burning […]
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America’s coal-burning power plants are shutting down at a rapid pace, forcing electric utilities to face the next big climate question: Embrace natural gas, or shift aggressively to renewable energy? Some large utilities, including Xcel Energy in the Upper Midwest, are now planning to sharply cut their coal and gas use in favor of cleaner […]
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Mars gave a good burp last week, but the gas has come and gone, leaving scientists no closer to knowing whether there is life on or beneath the red planet. Last Wednesday, scientists grew excited when NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover, while testing the air of Gale Crater, detected high levels of methane, which on Earth […]
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WASHINGTON — Michael R. Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, will donate $500 million to a new campaign to close every coal-fired power plant in the United States and halt the growth of natural gas, his foundation said Thursday. The new campaign, called Beyond Carbon, is designed to help eliminate coal by focusing […]
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