Introducing Drilled: Bridge to Nowhere

The Carbon Copy

We have a bonus episode from our friends at Drilled.

The sixth season of Drilled is all about the natural gas industry. In the last decade, the climate movement has begun to reject the idea of natural gas as a "bridge fuel.” As that story has become tougher to sell, the gas industry has shifted from greenwashing to all-out war with environmentalists.

The latest season of Drilled traces that shift, starting with the first gas ban proposed in Southern California and ending with the industry leveraging Russia's invasion of Ukraine to its benefit.

In this episode, we head to the college town of San Luis Obispo, California, where in April 2020 mayor Heidi Hartman announced a plan to become the first city in Southern California to ban gas in new buildings. The region's utility SoCal Gas – the largest gas utility in the country – sprung into action, threatening among other things to bus in large numbers of protestors to crowd the town and city hall, just as the pandemic was taking hold in the U.S.

Listen to Drilled anywhere you get podcasts.