The Philadelphia City Council approved the plan to build a Liquid Natural Gas Plant. This is the keystone of a project to bring PA natural gas to the world energy market when the long view says we should keep it in the ground for the sake of the planet and the interests of most PA citizens.
The promise of a revenue stream prompted the decision. Like so many energy decisions we make daily, this one has a cost to future generations that we can ignore for the moment. Who will notice or be able to measure the incremental impact on climate deterioration? For Philadelphia it a freebee – a simple vote “yes” yields an economic benefit.
But it also paves the way for a chain reaction of accelerated fracking, more pipelines, and cheap fossil fuel and indestructible plastic waste. All of these have long-term adverse impact on Pennsylvania residents and longer-term impacts on global progress toward a sustainable energy system.
