The Biden administration made waves in January by announcing a pause on permitting for new construction or significant expansions of U.S. facilities for exporting liquefied natural gas (LNG).  

These massive installations convert natural gas to liquefied methane by supercooling it to negative 260 degrees Fahrenheit, which reduces the volume of the methane 600-fold, making it easier to ship in the specially-designed tankers that maintain the LNG at -260F in cryogenic tanks. 

The facilities cost upwards of $20 billion to build and, according to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) there are eight currently operating in the U.S., with another seven approved and currently under construction as of February 2024. 

The pause, which applies only to the construction of new facilities not yet approved, was deemed necessary to give the Department of Energy time to analyze the need for new export capacity in light of changing global markets, U.S. trade policy, the effect massive exports have on U.S. energy security and the resulting higher cost of energy for Americans. 

The DOE also needs to evaluate the environmental and climate impacts of emissions from these enormous facilities, as well as the health impacts on the communities living nearby. The pause puts a hold on eight new proposed projects.

Imports of LNG into the U.S. peaked in 2007 and have declined ever since.  The U.S. became a net exporter of LNG in 2016, and the annual volume of exported LNG has grown exponentially in the intervening years. 

According to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, our processing capacity for the export of LNG has tripled since 2018, and is expected to triple once again with the completion of the new facilities already under construction.     

When the natural gas boom began in 2008, the environmental story was often framed as a comparison between gas and coal, coal being a much more damaging contributor to global warming.  More than a decade later, we know better: while methane burns cleaner than coal or fuel oil, it is a much more potent and damaging greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.  Natural gas production and transport leak vast amounts of methane into the air, while the hydraulic fracturing process has contaminated drinking water supplies in numerous communities. When the full life-cycle of natural gas is considered, it’s actually more damaging than coal. 

The other part of the story was American energy independence. In reality, the fracking boom was always about exporting American gas to global markets, where it could command a higher price. Cheniere began building an LNG import facility in Louisiana’s Sabine Pass in 2005, but by 2011 the company was lobbying the DOE for permission to convert the facility to one designed for export; in 2016, the company shipped the first load of American gas to Europe. 

More recently, the war in Ukraine provided a new rationale for increasing in U.S. natural gas exports to Europe, but the surge—and the underlying need—appear to be short-lived.  In late January, 60 members of the European Parliament signed a letter thanking the U.S. for supplying their countries during the fuel crisis that resulted from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but urging the Biden administration not to use Europe as “an excuse” to further expand new gas export terminals.  

Citing the climate damage that would result, as well as higher fuel costs for American families, the E.U. lawmakers reminded the president that Europe’s need for natural gas is steadily declining due to concerted climate efforts and an ongoing transition to renewable energy. South Korea, another ally that is a major importer of U.S. LNG, has also announced plans to dramatically reduce its reliance on fossil fuels. 

In fact, a recent report by Public Citizen and two environmental NGOs found that less than 20 percent of the LNG exported from the U.S. was going to Europe, and more than half of exported U.S. gas goes to global commodity traders who sell it to the highest bidder, such as China and India. As of September 2023, 80 percent of U.S.- exported LNG goes to countries with which we have no free trade agreement; this used to be the standard for deeming an export as “in the national interest.” 

Those realities have not prevented the petroleum lobby, oil state governors and federal and state legislators from proposing a range of actions that would perpetuate the status quo—by blocking the pause on new permits, by trying to revoke the Department of Energy’s authority to make trade policy decisions, by barring the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) from considering climate impacts when they approve energy projects, banning the Securities and Exchange Commission from requiring that companies disclose to investors climate vulnerabilities related to their operations, and by suing to revive coal leases on federal lands. They have successfully sued to bar the EPA and the DOJ from enforcing federal civil rights laws in Louisiana’s Cancer Alley to address disparate health impacts (including dramatically higher cancer rates, upper respiratory disease and birth defects) suffered by poor, minority and environmentally-compromised areas through the clustering of polluting industries—or even investigating such cases. Exxon is suing its own shareholders for proposing climate and governance policies. State legislatures are passing laws designed to intimidate, blacklist and even criminalize banks that adopt policies that support the transition away from fossil fuels.

We should make no mistake about the intention and ultimate consequence of these efforts: they are based upon a definition of “national interest” that would legally exclude any consideration of ordinary Americans’ health or safety, the environmental integrity and long-term economic stability of our communities, and our right to make our own energy choices individually or collectively through our consumer choices, our investments and pension plans, and at the ballot box.