New Air Study
A new study has been in the news lately claiming that natural gas likely will contribute more to global warming than burning coal because it is vented to the atmosphere in far larger quantities than previously thought (see, e.g., this article in the NYT). The problems with the study appear to be numerous, however, including the inappropriate use of "lost-and-unaccounted for" data from Texas and long-range transmission pipeline data from Russia; the misuse of a warming factor 45% higher than the one used, for example, by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); and the use of a 20-year limited time frame to study the effects of methane in the atmosphere rather than the commonly used 100-year time frame. See here.
Apparently others have noticed the issues - see here (Council on Foreign Relations).
