Leveraging Infrastructure As We Transition to a Net-Zero Economy
The success of our national efforts to meet ambitious greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals depends, in part, on the ability of our nation’s natural gas industry to innovate — in technology as well as operational practices — to reach those goals.
That’s the message I shared with leaders from the natural gas industry earlier this week.
The Municipal Gas Authority Board of Georgia is the nation’s largest nonprofit natural gas agency in the U.S., helping its members ensure the reliable, safe, and affordable delivery of natural gas to hundreds of thousands of customers each year. At this year’s Board Planning Retreat, I explored with members of the Gas Authority Board how their organizations will achieve deep decarbonization while supplying the energy needed to support economic growth, and I emphasized the role of leveraging existing infrastructure to meet those two objectives.
Our existing energy systems operate in an incredibly integrated and interdependent manner. Throughout the U.S., there are 3 million miles of natural gas pipelines delivering energy to a diverse set of customers and communities. These systems — vast but connected, needed but often unnoticed — are expected to deliver on an array of performance characteristics, such as reliability, safety, affordability, and deliverability.
To achieve deep decarbonization economy-wide while providing the energy needed to power our economy, the U.S. should leverage the assets we already have. That includes leveraging our existing infrastructure — and that means the natural gas industry is uniquely positioned to take a leading role.
To ensure we are on track to meet ambitious net-zero targets, we must ensure the molecules we produce, store, transport, and consume are increasingly lower carbon. Vital to enabling a just transition for communities across the country will be research to guide us in putting existing infrastructure to work in storing, transporting, and delivering increasingly low-carbon molecules, as well as integrating those molecules with other low-carbon energy system components such as wind, solar, and battery storage, to name a few. GTI Energy is partnering with infrastructure operators to investigate those research questions.
The role of communities and their decision-making power must remain in our line of sight as we consider increasingly diverse and interdependent energy systems. Prioritizing how we can leverage existing infrastructure assets will help to ensure we meet the needs of every community and region in these transitions, while spurring economic growth and job creation in these communities.
As the U.S. pursues efforts to achieve net-zero emissions economy-wide by mid-century, recent policy developments in Washington and investor signals on Wall Street indicate that transitions to low-cost, low-carbon energy systems are well underway. It’s critical that the natural gas industry step up to this opportunity by embracing the vital role that not only these assets but the people that operate them will serve in creating a low-cost, low-carbon future for our energy systems.
