Committed to addressing the country’s severe air pollution, China is attempting a shift from coal to natural gas and is considering a variety of sources, including domestic and imported gas options as well as creating its own synthetic gas from coal.
Committed to addressing the country’s severe air pollution, China is attempting a shift from coal to natural gas and is considering a variety of sources, including domestic and imported gas options as well as creating its own synthetic gas from coal.
A team of researchers led by Princeton University investigated the environmental impacts of transitioning from coal to natural gas in China, exploring implications on air quality, carbon mitigation and water stress by the year 2020.
The findings, published in Nature Sustainability, warn that the use of coal-based synthetic natural gas, known by the acronym “SNG,” would increase carbon emissions and water demand, especially in regions in China that already have high per capita carbon emissions and water scarcity.
Overall, the researchers find that a switch from coal to other natural gas types does produce air, carbon and water co-benefits when methane leakage, a powerful greenhouse gas, is well controlled. However, there are trade-offs when it comes to degree of improvements for air quality and water scarcity — depending in which sector the natural gas is used to substitute for coal and where that substitution takes place.
Read more at Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
Image: The use of coal-based synthetic natural gas, known by the acronym "SNG," would increase carbon emissions and water demand, especially in regions in China that already have high per capita carbon emissions and water scarcity, according to a new paper in Nature Sustainability. (Credit: Egan Jimenez, Princeton University)
