Why won't you die already?

“For too long, the fossil fuel industry has had a destructive grip on our governments. Since at least the 1970s, they have known about the harms of fossil fuels and dangers of climate change, and yet they covered it up.”

The above is a quote from a letter that several hundred organisations wrote to President Biden with a call to stop “all LNG and related fossil fuel infrastructure permits across all U.S. federal agencies” following the so-called pause on LNG export permit approvals from earlier this year.

The letter is full of exactly the kind of industry-bashing we have now come to expect from the NGO world, grim warnings of gas being a threat to public health and, of course, “best evidence” that “demonstrates that LNG exports are at minimum 27% worse than coal for our climate, given the methane and other emissions associated with the entire life cycle of drilling, fracking, and then liquefaction and transportation.”

The letter is a brilliant instance of “Give them a finger and they’ll take the whole hand” in real life but it is more than just that. It is the latest in a mounting pile of evidence that the transition push has nothing to do with emissions, not really. It has to do with a burning desire to put an end to the whole oil and gas industry. There are so many people without anything better to do with their lives we should be all scared.

The LNG letter to Biden comes as the UK government extends a windfall profit tax for the oil and gas industry for another year and as Canadian NGOs push for a ban on oil and gas advertising. Oh, and there’s been a new attack on gas in the U.S., this time with pipeline leaks in the crosshairs.

Of course, the EU is also on the offence, with plans to make the oil and gas industry “help pay for fighting climate change in poorer countries under a United Nations target.” I’m willing to wager that some in the climate advocacy world are biting themselves because they can’t blame climate change on the tobacco industry, too. Unless I just gave them an idea, in which case I do apologise. All these attacks will intensify. Finger, whole hand, then moving on to devour the whole body. We’re going to be seeing more of this.