Questions on climate have been somewhat far from the spotlight on the presidential campaign trail, with one big exception: fracking.
Fracking is the primary way U.S. fossil-fuel companies procure natural gas, making it a major facet of the current U.S. energy mix. The process shoots super-pressurized water, sand, or gas into shale rock deep underground, which forces hidden pockets of methane to emerge. The fact that the practice is bad news, environmentally speaking, is far (far) from a secret. Living near a well has well-documented public health harms, and methane leaks have major global warming potential.
Yet, the public perception of fracking is a bit of a mixed bag. Why? Because methane’s day-to-day persona as “natural gas” does a great job of dissembling the fuel’s dirty implications. While the name itself is not necessarily wrong, it has become a turbocharged greenwashing tool for the fossil-fuel industry—so much so that activists are pushing for a rebrand.
Why do we call it ‘natural gas’?
The origin of the phrase “natural gas” is actually pretty benign—and boring. Vox published what’s become the prevailing history, which goes like this: When folks in the 19th century observed methane rising out of cracks in the ground, they compared it to the whale oil and coal that had ruled the day. It was colorless and odorless and required far less processing, thus, people saw it as natural, and the name stuck. Since then, the oil and gas industry has run with it.
People know what it means, though, right?
Not really! A 2020 survey co-authored by the Yale Program on Climate Communications and Climate Nexus found that 76% of Americans have a favorable attitude toward “natural gas.” However, when respondents are asked about methane gas, that percentage drops to 42%. The survey also found that participants associate “natural gas” with words like “clean,” and not with methane at all, suggesting many people do not even realize the true nature (hah) of the fuel.
What makes things even more confusing is that the fossil-fuel industry has doubled down on making methane sound even more legit. Have you encountered the phrase certified natural gas or “responsible gas”? This label centers on the idea that gas producers can gain a certification for reducing excess emissions and leaks in the refining process—and then charge more for it. Nearly 40% of gas produced in the United States is currently certified. “One of the biggest problems I have with it is that it’s being used as justification to continue oil and gas production—and to expand and ramp up extraction,” says Dakota Raynes, a researcher at Earthworks, an advocacy and research group focused on oil, gas, and mineral extraction.
Plus, much of this additional layer of oversight doesn’t even work, according to a 2023 report by Earthworks and Oil Change International on which Raynes was the lead co-author. The report looked at a site monitored by Project Canary, one of the three main certification groups, and found that the watchdog failed to recognize all of the 22 leaks and pollution events that happened in the seven-month monitoring period. The following year, the company caught only one out of 23. “Regardless of the sample size, what our research really shows is that there’s a serious lack of transparency in all this. Certification is sort of a big black Pandora’s box,” Raynes adds.
What’s being done about it?
This February, a group of seven senators wrote to the Federal Trade Commission, asking them to crack down on the greenwashing of certified natural gas. The senators pointed to certification as “another dangerous greenwashing scheme” at play, the same way calling it “natural” or a “bridge fuel” to renewables is.
The senators are among a growing swell of advocacy groups, leaders, and academics peeling back the adjective “natural” in favor of labels that more closely represent the reality of the situation. Instead, they might use the terms “methane gas,” “shale gas,” “fracked gas,” “fossil gas,” or any variation of those (like “fracked methane gas”). As for the major party candidates on the campaign trail? It may be a while before we hear them use any of this language when it comes to the political land mine of pumping gas out of the ground.