{"id":6599,"date":"2025-07-13T12:02:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-13T12:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/6599\/"},"modified":"2025-07-13T12:02:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-13T12:02:08","slug":"louisiana-is-the-latest-state-to-greenwash-gas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/6599\/","title":{"rendered":"Louisiana is the latest state to greenwash gas"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

In Louisiana, natural gas \u2014 a planet-heating fossil fuel \u2014 is now, by law, considered \u201cgreen energy\u201d that can compete with solar and wind projects for clean energy funding. The law, signed by Republican Governor Jeff Landry last month, comes on the heels of similar bills passed in Ohio, Tennessee, and Indiana. What the bills have in common \u2014 besides an \u201cupdated definition\u201d of a fossil fuel as a clean energy source \u2014\u00a0is language seemingly plucked straight from a right-wing think tank backed by oil and gas billionaire and activist Charles Koch<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Louisiana\u2019s law was based on a template<\/a> created by the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, a conservative organization that brings legislators and corporate lobbyists together to draft bills \u201cdedicated to the principles of limited government, free markets and federalism.<\/a>\u201d The law maintains that Louisiana, in order to minimize its reliance on \u201cforeign adversary nations\u201d for energy, must ensure that natural gas and nuclear power are eligible for \u201call state programs that fund \u2018green energy\u2019 or \u2018clean energy\u2019 initiatives.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But natural gas, also known as methane gas, is no more \u201cnatural\u201d than any other fossil fuel. Its primary ingredient is methane, an intense heat-trapping gas that is far more potent than the carbon pollution produced by coal and oil, though it doesn\u2019t stay in the atmosphere as long. It\u2019s often marketed as a \u201cbridge fuel\u201d \u2014 a less harmful fossil fuel that can be used as communities transition away from coal \u2014 but studies have found that over the long term, the planet-warming impact of the natural gas industry may be equivalent to that of coal. <\/a>That\u2019s because gas pipelines often leak; according to an Environmental Defense Fund analysis<\/a>, natural gas pipelines in the U.S. allow between 1.2 million and 2.6 million tons of methane to escape into the atmosphere each year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Louisiana State Representative Jacob Landry first introduced a near-identical bill to the model posted on ALEC\u2019s website and to the other bills that have passed in Ohio<\/a>, Tennessee<\/a>, and Indiana<\/a>. (The Washington Post reported<\/a> in 2023 that ALEC was involved in Ohio\u2019s bill; ALEC denies involvement.) Landry, who represents a small district in the southern part of the state, is the recipient of significant fossil fuel-industry funding \u2014 and co-owns two oil and gas consulting firms<\/a> himself. During his campaign for the state Legislature, Landry received donations from at least 15 fossil-fuel-affiliated companies and PACs, including Exxon Mobil (which has also funded ALEC) and Phillips 66. Those donations alone totaled over $20,000.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Representative Landry did not respond to multiple requests for comment. ALEC did not get back to Grist in time for publication.<\/p>\n

While Louisiana has one of the least reliable grids<\/a> in the country, that lack of reliability is in large part due to the state\u2019s reliance on natural gas, which provides most of its electricity, according to a 2025 report<\/a> from the Louisiana Legislative Auditor\u2019s Office.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBest practices have found that gas plants are susceptible to large-scale failures during extreme weather,\u201d the auditors wrote<\/a>. \u201cDiversifying the energy sources used for electricity generation is a priority.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bills that benefit both the fossil fuel industry and the individual lawmakers who introduce them aren\u2019t exactly a new genre in Louisiana, said Laura Peterson, a senior analyst with the Union of Concerned Scientists. What\u2019s less standard is that this one is dressed up in climate-friendly language.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLouisiana is a classic example of a captured state,\u201d Peterson said. \u201cTheir state economy is just so dependent on fossil fuels and petrochemicals.\u201d (The amount of money the fossil fuel industry brings to Louisiana\u2019s people, though, has been on the decline<\/a> since the turn of the century.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

The state accounts for about 10 percent of the country\u2019s natural gas production and holds about 6 percent of U.S. natural gas reserves. Natural gas is already used to generate about three-quarters of the state\u2019s electricity, and building out more pipeline projects to carry liquefied natural gas, or LNG, won\u2019t necessarily make electricity bills cheaper for residents, Peterson said.<\/p>\n

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Louisiana already has 4 LNG terminals. It just added another.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cBuilding LNG infrastructure is not going to lower anyone\u2019s energy prices in the short term,\u201d since it takes many years to build a pipeline, Peterson said. \u201cAnd there\u2019s a lot of research that shows that overreliance on gas leaves power grids vulnerable to extreme weather, which Louisiana has a lot of.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jeffrey Clark, president of the Louisiana Advanced Power Alliance \u2014 an industry group representing both renewable and fossil fuel energy companies and investors \u2014 testified in opposition to the bill in early June.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis legislation is being promoted as a solution to Louisiana\u2019s reliability challenges. But with all due respect, it is a solution in search of a problem,\u201d Clark said<\/a>. \u201cWe support fossil fuels as a key part of the nation\u2019s energy mix, but codifying them as the only acceptable path forward dismisses a growing body of evidence that grid reliability depends on resource diversity.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Fossil fuel advocacy groups lauded the move. Larry Behrens of the nonprofit Power the Future wrote<\/a> that the legislation turns Louisiana into an \u201cenergy sanctuary state,\u201d taking \u201ca direct shot at the China-backed solar and wind lobby.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reclassifying natural gas as \u201cgreen\u201d energy<\/a> means that proposed natural gas pipelines may be able to access funding that would otherwise have gone to new solar or wind projects; it may also make natural gas companies more appealing to environmentally conscious investors. ALEC, the right-wing think tank that provided the template language for Landry\u2019s bill, noted in a press release<\/a> that resolutions like this could pave the way for more AI data centers in the state, too. \u201cRedefining \u2018green energy\u2019 allows utilities to continue using natural gas while fulfilling state \u2018green energy\u2019 or \u2018clean energy\u2019 initiatives,\u201d ALEC staffer Mark Lucas wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Over the years, ALEC has succeeded in getting laws that benefit fossil fuel companies passed across the country. Recently the group, which was founded in the 1970s, has helped draft legislation criminalizing grassroots protest<\/a> against pipelines, gas terminals, and other fossil fuel infrastructure \u2014 versions of that bill had passed in 17 states by 2022. They have also drafted bills aiming to punish economic boycotts<\/a> of the oil industry. And there are currently 114 different model policies related to energy on their website, 23 of which specifically address \u201cgreen energy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s classic greenwashing, right?\u201d said Peterson of the new Louisiana law \u2014 using the language of sustainability to describe an activity that\u2019s actually not sustainable at all. \u201cThe intent of these laws is to allow the build-out of fossil fuel infrastructure, which will perpetuate the use of fossil fuels for decades to come.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In Louisiana, natural gas \u2014 a planet-heating fossil fuel \u2014 is now, by law, considered \u201cgreen energy\u201d that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6600,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[7045,1872,192,7046,111,79,6383],"class_list":{"0":"post-6599","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-accountability","9":"tag-energy","10":"tag-environment","11":"tag-language","12":"tag-politics","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-yahoo"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6599"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6599\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}