Recent estimates produced by the Global Carbon Project,  an academic consortium, detailed an unexpected story regarding carbon dioxide emissions in the United States: carbon emissions from coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, are on a steady decline, and carbon emissions from natural gas now surpass coal. The new data adds fuel to a heated debate about the role of supposedly-clean natural gas.

According to the data, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the U.S. from natural gas are projected to increase by 3.5 percent from 2018 to 2019. For comparison, carbon dioxide emissions from coal were down by 10.5 percent.  Oil is still the top emitter in the United States.

“Coal use dropped another ten percent this year and is down by half since 2005. Cheaper natural gas and solar power are gaining market share,” Rob Jackson, a professor of Earth system science in Stanford’s School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences, who contributed to the report, explained to Salon via email. “But more than half of our natural gas goes to industry and homes for […]