What if we all started calling it methane gas. ‘Natural gas” gives a false sense of it being a positive thing. Coal is natural too but we don’t call it natural coal.
Not quite the same. Methane is more accurate and something everyone will accept as harmful. Fossil has wider meanings so less clear. Fracking is a method and implies that it’s just the method of extraction that is the issue.
A great political asset that the anti-nuclear movement had was a roster of retired military brass, like Admirals Gene La Rocque and Eugene Carroll. As public voices, they brought credibility and gravitas to the campaign. The climate crisis needs to be framed as a national security concern along with all its other dangers.
Best chance for permit reform in the next 4 years died today due to some bad advice from 350 and other environmental groups. Citizens' Climate Lobby fought to the end to pass it, but Big Green helped kill it
Thank you Bill for making this newsletter free. I am a widow and retired 77 yr old lawyer and teacher and a high IQ person, but live in poverty ($2650 a month). Your newsletter allows me to keep my intellectual life alive. Recently was passed to become a LYFT Driver in New Mexico.(one of the few employers other than WallMart that does not age discriminate). They will rent me an EV car for $100 less a week than a gas car. Probably Biden bill stimulus,right?
I am happy to support your work, as a paid subscriber, but given recent information about the direction Substack is heading (see link), I am not happy to support the Substack platform.
I’ve been following your lead since 2006, The End of Nature. My wife and I attended the 7 Stages in Little Five Points Atlanta rally when you were promoting Hillary Clinton in 2016. I’ve been a paying member of your Substack blog for years.
And through all that time you have been a Democratic Party enabler. You supported that party for decades as the only ‘rational’ option for progressive voters. And what has that achieved? Trump in 2016 and 2024.
I wasted my vote in both elections by following your lead. Your leadership and the leadership of the DNC and the Democratic party has failed the country. One would think that you and the party would clean house to get rid of the inept leaders at the top who consistently assume that they are always the smartest people in the room. How idiotic and disappointing!
Your time has passed. The time of the leadership of the Clintonites is done. Maybe the Democratic party is done.
Please do the honorable thing and just retire along with all of your Democrat egg heads. You have nearly destroyed the party. Don’t try to hang on until you complete the job…please. Because if you do it could completely destroy what’s left of our so called democracy.
Get our of the way and allow the real progressives in the party to assert a completely reformed set of ideals.
Fair enough. I obviously supported My forehand neighbor Bernie in 2016 (and even served as one of his five delegates to the platform writing committee) but when he lost I agreed with him that Hilary was far superior to Trump and so as you say worked hard for her. Ditto 2020–and I’d argue that Bernie’s good judgment in backing Biden was rewarded with the IRA. And I supported Kamala this time. I’d stand by all those choices. But I look forward to you and your fellow ‘real progressives’ finding and nominating the next candidate. In the meantime I’ll keep working on all the things that aren’t electoral politics, which is where most of my effort has always gone
To Elaine -- I'm on your side - because there is an available means of installing clean / very inexpensive / electricity "where needed" / "as much as is needed at any 'stationary' or 'movable' site" / "for as long as is needed".
But it unfortunately doesn't seem to fit into to Bill's area of interest - as he has had the information about the power supply for months.
This is Bill's substack - and he has the complete right to not say "boo" about it -- but I then feel that he has given me the right to comment on his topics - - unless he chooses to "expel me" for speaking truth.
Bill - unfortunately you've been reading the wrong news. It is true that Europe almost has the LNG needed to maketi through the winter -- but they didn't get it cheaply - and they didn't get it from their own internal sources -- they had to import it - from the US and elsewhere; so when you make statements in the future - how about telling all of it - instead of what you just want to spin.
You a good man Bill - and you have been a beacon for us, helping to bring the climate situation to all of us, so speaking only for myself -- I would appreciate getting all of the information.
"Honesty is a lot better than its opposite." Amen to that! There is a surprising amount of hope here, and more to keep an eye out for. Thanks for making it visible. Happy Advent.
Thank you Tom, A great and hopeful update on the status of the climate change leading to over heating global warming. The fact that some fat cat corp[orations will complain if trump dispenses with EVs is great news, He cares nothing about people worth less than 500 million but his ears will perk up for his billionaire buddies.
This is rich -- Bill - your a one trick pony some times -- LNG is not good - but it's a lot less harmful when people are freezing in Europe. Get a heart.
LNG is methane gas with chemicals mixed in. Fracking chemicals are picked up by bush fires passing by and carried for miles. As Bill says. The sun is free.
People lived without “natural” gas for hundreds and thousands of years, it’s a relatively new thing to burn gas for heat. And they stayed warm in Europe without natural gas.
Living in one room with heavy draperies on the doors and widows that dragged on the floor and one lovely tiny fireplace to gather round till it was time to run through the cold house to get to bed. Oh yes, and layered clothing.
Works for me. I’m not a pampered spoiled person that has to live in a 80° house. And I don’t use gas or electricity to heat my house. I have a small fireplace for one room.
We need to close the growing US carbon price gap with Carbon Fee and Dividend with a CBAM. This will siphon the profits out of selling fossil fuels, making build export terminals a losing proposition. The cash-back dividend will help low and middle income families. The CBAM will push it worldwide. The price ($10/tCO2e more annually) will get us halfway to our global 1.5°C goal.
What if we all started calling it methane gas. ‘Natural gas” gives a false sense of it being a positive thing. Coal is natural too but we don’t call it natural coal.
or fossil gas, or fracked gas. all good!
Not quite the same. Methane is more accurate and something everyone will accept as harmful. Fossil has wider meanings so less clear. Fracking is a method and implies that it’s just the method of extraction that is the issue.
A great political asset that the anti-nuclear movement had was a roster of retired military brass, like Admirals Gene La Rocque and Eugene Carroll. As public voices, they brought credibility and gravitas to the campaign. The climate crisis needs to be framed as a national security concern along with all its other dangers.
Best chance for permit reform in the next 4 years died today due to some bad advice from 350 and other environmental groups. Citizens' Climate Lobby fought to the end to pass it, but Big Green helped kill it
Thank you Bill for making this newsletter free. I am a widow and retired 77 yr old lawyer and teacher and a high IQ person, but live in poverty ($2650 a month). Your newsletter allows me to keep my intellectual life alive. Recently was passed to become a LYFT Driver in New Mexico.(one of the few employers other than WallMart that does not age discriminate). They will rent me an EV car for $100 less a week than a gas car. Probably Biden bill stimulus,right?
Many thanks for reading! And driving an electric LYFT is a good way to keep doing some educating--keep spreading the good word about EVs
I wrote a 2 page piece I can share called: What Can You do About the Climate if you Retired? While it will say it is three years old, I just put it on the site today: https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/4029274671625439520/7879481012839478233
This is a Google Blogspot Hope to year from you in the comments! Dennis Nord
For some reason it won’t open for me
It's been a while since I used this site, here's a better starting point and it updated the date: https://climatecareermoves.blogspot.com/
Thanks for checking this Bill !
this is very very smart--and I will pass it around!
https://www.thehandbasket.co/subscribe?ref=QQNqL9J36t
I am happy to support your work, as a paid subscriber, but given recent information about the direction Substack is heading (see link), I am not happy to support the Substack platform.
Bill McKibben,
I’ve been following your lead since 2006, The End of Nature. My wife and I attended the 7 Stages in Little Five Points Atlanta rally when you were promoting Hillary Clinton in 2016. I’ve been a paying member of your Substack blog for years.
And through all that time you have been a Democratic Party enabler. You supported that party for decades as the only ‘rational’ option for progressive voters. And what has that achieved? Trump in 2016 and 2024.
I wasted my vote in both elections by following your lead. Your leadership and the leadership of the DNC and the Democratic party has failed the country. One would think that you and the party would clean house to get rid of the inept leaders at the top who consistently assume that they are always the smartest people in the room. How idiotic and disappointing!
Your time has passed. The time of the leadership of the Clintonites is done. Maybe the Democratic party is done.
Please do the honorable thing and just retire along with all of your Democrat egg heads. You have nearly destroyed the party. Don’t try to hang on until you complete the job…please. Because if you do it could completely destroy what’s left of our so called democracy.
Get our of the way and allow the real progressives in the party to assert a completely reformed set of ideals.
Fair enough. I obviously supported My forehand neighbor Bernie in 2016 (and even served as one of his five delegates to the platform writing committee) but when he lost I agreed with him that Hilary was far superior to Trump and so as you say worked hard for her. Ditto 2020–and I’d argue that Bernie’s good judgment in backing Biden was rewarded with the IRA. And I supported Kamala this time. I’d stand by all those choices. But I look forward to you and your fellow ‘real progressives’ finding and nominating the next candidate. In the meantime I’ll keep working on all the things that aren’t electoral politics, which is where most of my effort has always gone
To Elaine -- I'm on your side - because there is an available means of installing clean / very inexpensive / electricity "where needed" / "as much as is needed at any 'stationary' or 'movable' site" / "for as long as is needed".
But it unfortunately doesn't seem to fit into to Bill's area of interest - as he has had the information about the power supply for months.
This is Bill's substack - and he has the complete right to not say "boo" about it -- but I then feel that he has given me the right to comment on his topics - - unless he chooses to "expel me" for speaking truth.
Bill - unfortunately you've been reading the wrong news. It is true that Europe almost has the LNG needed to maketi through the winter -- but they didn't get it cheaply - and they didn't get it from their own internal sources -- they had to import it - from the US and elsewhere; so when you make statements in the future - how about telling all of it - instead of what you just want to spin.
You a good man Bill - and you have been a beacon for us, helping to bring the climate situation to all of us, so speaking only for myself -- I would appreciate getting all of the information.
"Honesty is a lot better than its opposite." Amen to that! There is a surprising amount of hope here, and more to keep an eye out for. Thanks for making it visible. Happy Advent.
What is LNG? CH4?
Bob Howarth is a national treasure. He’s been warning us about CH4 for years and years. I’m so glad this report is out there.
To Bill Addington -- a simple question -- how do you know whether they sayed warm? Did you go back and ask them?
Thank you Tom, A great and hopeful update on the status of the climate change leading to over heating global warming. The fact that some fat cat corp[orations will complain if trump dispenses with EVs is great news, He cares nothing about people worth less than 500 million but his ears will perk up for his billionaire buddies.
This is rich -- Bill - your a one trick pony some times -- LNG is not good - but it's a lot less harmful when people are freezing in Europe. Get a heart.
Europe is awash in natural gas, and as the Europeans have made clear they do not need increased US supply. Germany announced today they are closing their LNG import terminal https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Germany-To-Shut-Down-Key-LNG-Terminal-In-2025.html
LNG is methane gas with chemicals mixed in. Fracking chemicals are picked up by bush fires passing by and carried for miles. As Bill says. The sun is free.
People lived without “natural” gas for hundreds and thousands of years, it’s a relatively new thing to burn gas for heat. And they stayed warm in Europe without natural gas.
Living in one room with heavy draperies on the doors and widows that dragged on the floor and one lovely tiny fireplace to gather round till it was time to run through the cold house to get to bed. Oh yes, and layered clothing.
Works for me. I’m not a pampered spoiled person that has to live in a 80° house. And I don’t use gas or electricity to heat my house. I have a small fireplace for one room.
Bill - this is your situation by choice.
One comment -- so what.
Methane gas heating gave us bigger houses and asthma.
We need to close the growing US carbon price gap with Carbon Fee and Dividend with a CBAM. This will siphon the profits out of selling fossil fuels, making build export terminals a losing proposition. The cash-back dividend will help low and middle income families. The CBAM will push it worldwide. The price ($10/tCO2e more annually) will get us halfway to our global 1.5°C goal.
bit.ly/carbon-price-gap-presentation