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Isn’t natgas basically a waste product? As in no one is setting out to produce it, it just shows up when you produce other hydrocarbons? So either it’s going t

Isn’t natgas basically a waste product? As in no one is setting out to produce it, it just shows up when you produce other hydrocarbons? So either it’s going to get released, flared off, or something useful will get done with it even if it goes to $0.

detaro 1y ago
Yes and no. It is a by-product of oil wells, but there are also pure gas fields only harvesting it.
epistasis 1y ago
You still have to move it to the generation turbines, store it, and maintain the turbines. Even if the price of extracting natural gas is zero or negative, it may not be economical to use it for electricity generation in the future. Solar, wind, and storage are a major disruption of our energy technology. They do not follow the same cost curves, and fuel-based generation is already a very mature technology. We are either at early ages or teenager years for solar and storage, we don't know where they will end up when mature, but it's going to be so much cheaper than it is now.
deleted 1y ago
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njarboe 1y ago
In the eastern US much of the fracking done is to extract natural gas. Not a waste product there.
detourdog 1y ago
In some cases it is a waste product but not in the USA we also have fracking which is a toxic waste producer. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fracking https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fracking
Izikiel43 1y ago
In Argentina there is a very large operation to get natural gas from fracking, and export it to other countries besides local usage.
pfdietz 1y ago
There's quite a lot of "dry" (non-byproduct) natural gas being produced.
folmar 1y ago
It's the LPG that is a byproduct (of both natural gas and crude oil distillation).
bobthepanda 1y ago
It's not just that; gas has to be transported, and your options are generally either pipelines or LNG, neither of which have a nonzero cost, and LNG is actually quite expensive.
AnthonyMouse 1y ago
The assumption there is that hydrocarbon production isn't going to decline. The majority of oil production is for transportation, so what happens as electric cars and plug-in hybrids that can run in full electric mode 95% of the time become a higher percentage of the installed base?

detaro 1y ago

Yes and no. It is a by-product of oil wells, but there are also pure gas fields only harvesting it.

epistasis 1y ago

You still have to move it to the generation turbines, store it, and maintain the turbines. Even if the price of extracting natural gas is zero or negative, it may not be economical to use it for electricity generation in the future. Solar, wind, and storage are a major disruption of our energy technology. They do not follow the same cost curves, and fuel-based generation is already a very mature technology. We are either at early ages or teenager years for solar and storage, we don't know where they will end up when mature, but it's going to be so much cheaper than it is now.

deleted 1y ago

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njarboe 1y ago

In the eastern US much of the fracking done is to extract natural gas. Not a waste product there.

detourdog 1y ago

In some cases it is a waste product but not in the USA we also have fracking which is a toxic waste producer. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fracking https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fracking

Izikiel43 1y ago

In Argentina there is a very large operation to get natural gas from fracking, and export it to other countries besides local usage.

pfdietz 1y ago

There's quite a lot of "dry" (non-byproduct) natural gas being produced.

folmar 1y ago

It's the LPG that is a byproduct (of both natural gas and crude oil distillation).

bobthepanda 1y ago

It's not just that; gas has to be transported, and your options are generally either pipelines or LNG, neither of which have a nonzero cost, and LNG is actually quite expensive.

AnthonyMouse 1y ago

The assumption there is that hydrocarbon production isn't going to decline. The majority of oil production is for transportation, so what happens as electric cars and plug-in hybrids that can run in full electric mode 95% of the time become a higher percentage of the installed base?