Webinar On-Demand: American Pipe Dream

Video courtesy of the Pulitzer Center. United States, 2024.

Part of the "Fuel, Foul Air, and Fallout: The Health Tolls of Energy and Defense in the United States" webinar series

The story of American liquefied natural gas (LNG) began with promises of economic benefits, political sovereignty, and an eventual green transition. It continues by way of explosive growth, long-term purchase and infrastructure agreements, and untold methane and toxic chemical leakage. There is no end in sight.

Grantees Quinn Glabicki and Carlyle Calhoun reported on Pittsburgh gas giant EQT’s production and Venture Global’s export of natural gas on the Marcellus Shale and the Gulf Coast, respectively. Pulitzer Center Senior Editor Steve Sapienza moderated a conversation with them during the webinar “American Pipe Dream: Natural Gas and Its Health Impacts in the United States.”

As part of his Pulitzer Center-supported project EQT’s Gas Play, Glabicki followed four families living near a hollow home to fracking wells in West Virginia. “How is this manifesting in communities on the ground?” he asked. Many have been “sickened and displaced,” he added.

Calhoun and her reporting partner Halle Parker followed the gas from an export facility in Louisiana to Germany, which imports LNG, and Japan, which finances it, for their series All Gassed Up.

Natural gas was characterized as a “bridge fuel” to renewables in the 2010s. U.S. LNG exports have grown 65% each year since 2010, delivering enormous profits to gas companies. Natural gas is just a bridge to more gas. Japan Gas has even found a way to mix both talking points in the slogan “go gastainable.”

“There’s a dialogue going on in parallel to the climate claims that are being made from a geopolitical stance,” Calhoun added.

LNG sourced from the United States supplemented Western Europe’s supply after Russia invaded Ukraine and severed supply to some NATO countries in 2022. Not long thereafter, the United States became the largest exporter of LNG in the world.

The consequences of this expansion are many. They fuel rising household gas prices in the United States as exports grow the country’s stake in a volatile market, contribute to global warming, and may result in adverse health outcomes for people who live near well pads and export terminals in the U.S..

Methane, the principal compound in natural gas that contributes to the greenhouse effect, traps on average about 80 times more heat than carbon dioxide over its first 20 years after it is released into the atmosphere. Gas leaks occur at well pads, pipelines, processing, transport, and reheating at import facilities. There is no systematic effort to track and address leaks. There are, however, estimations from organizations like the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI).

Coal, said Glabicki, is “no longer a relevant comparison.” What is “the opportunity cost of building up our LNG infrastructure and does that come at the cost of building up our renewable infrastructure?” he asked.

The Biden administration paused pending decisions on exports of LNG to non-Free Trade Agreement countries in January 2024. A Louisiana judge blocked the executive order in July. The White House has appealed. 

Whether or not it goes through, the pause may be symbolic. Already permitted projects along the Gulf Coast are set to double the United States’ capacity to export natural gas. Japan, meanwhile, is financing LNG infrastructure projects in Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam.

“We’re locking growing countries into gas infrastructure that, once those investments have been made,” investors will demand returns, warned Calhoun.

People who live near fracking wells on the Marcellus fault experience adverse health effects that may be caused by methane and other volatile organic compounds (VOCs) used to frack. When inhaled, these chemicals are “known to cause dizziness, headaches, tremors, anxiety, confusion, nerve damage, muscle fatigue and, at high levels, death,” according to Glabicki in “Hollowed Out.”

Calhoun spoke with residents near Calcasieu Pass, in Louisiana, where Venture Global has a large export facility. The residents told her that the facility flared toxic chemicals in violation of an air pollution permit issued by the state. Under public pressure, the company released a Semiannual Monitoring Report that revealed they had been out of compliance with the permit for most of 2022 and 2023.

“There is no oversight as far as air monitoring is concerned,” said Calhoun.

While the results are not admissible in state and federal regulatory investigations, people who live near Venture Global’s Calcasieu Pass export facility and EQT’s West Virginia well pads have begun documenting foul air and health symptoms. Some have even used special FLIR cameras to show invisible, noxious fumes billowing from wells and export facilities. After several complaints, the Environmental Protection Agency has begun to take notice.

Others have chosen to leave. Venture Global has offered some residents buyouts in the “spirit of being a good neighbor,” according to Calhoun. The same royalties that sweetened a land lease deal on their property bought them a new one somewhere else, according to Glabicki’s reporting.

“Federal policy as far as LNG exports is really going to dictate the amount of gas that we’re producing here,” said Glabicki. “That whole price equation—those margins are razor thin.”

With an upcoming U.S. presidential election, the panelists agreed that the future of LNG may be at stake.

One audience member at the webinar praised the reporting, saying: “Such on-the-ground investigative journalism is key to counter dominant narratives and greenwashing efforts, as are the international connections [Calhoun and Parker have] been looking into.”

Another said: “I am grateful to the Pulitzer Center and these journalists for their work in bringing this complex and sometimes opaque process to light. [...] This was an hour well spent!”