“Godfather” Of Green Movement Backs Fracking As A Way To Reduce Emissions

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Written By:
Rob Port

Jun 25, 2012
8:53am

I wrote back in April about James Lovelock, the scientist whose theories about the environment set the foundation for the modern green movement. Lovelock was making news at the time for repudiating his past environmental alarmism, admitting that he and others like Al Gore were wrong.

Lovelock, who still believes in anthropogenic global warming, has set the heads of greenies spinning again in a Guardian interview by endorsing hydraulic fracturing as a way to reduce emissions from energy production.

“Gas is almost a give-away in the U.S. at the moment. They’ve gone for fracking in a big way. This is what makes me very cross with the greens for trying to knock it,” said Lovelock. “Let’s be pragmatic and sensible and get Britain to switch everything to methane. We should be going mad on it.”

I’ve pointed out previously that fracking has done more to reduce carbon emissions in the US than Al Gore, Barack Obama and every single wind turbine and solar panel ever built. What fracking has done is made natural gas cheaper than ever before, making a more cost effective source of energy than coal. That’s it’s cleaner too is just gravy.

That environmentalists oppose fracking is surprising, but only if you assume modern environmentalism is really about the environment and not politics and control.