For years, a small but loud group of campaigners have insisted that natural gas is no better than coal – a talking point repeated so often that it managed to lodge itself in parts of the public discourse. Anyone who works in energy knows the argument never matched the data. And now we have a real-world example that makes the case in stark, almost brutal terms.
If natural gas truly had the same emissions footprint as coal, China would have no reason to build an entirely new industry to manufacture synthetic gas out of coal at immense cost. Yet that is precisely what is happening.
Coal-to-gas: a massive, fast-moving industrial pivot
Reuters has documented a build-out in northern China that borders on the surreal. Inner Mongolia’s Shenhua Ordos plant – commissioned in 2008 – was China’s first coal-to-liquids (CTL) project. The underlying chemistry dates back to Germany in the 1920s, but the scale China is pushing toward is unprecedented.
China’s CTL and coal-to-gas (CTG) sector burned 276 million tonnes of coal last year. According to the analysis cited by Reuters, that figure could double within five years.
The fastest-growing piece of this industrial machine is coal-to-gas:
- Coal-to-gas capacity already under construction is four times greater than what China built in the past decade.
- New plants will more than double annual synthetic gas output to 19.5 billion cubic metres – about 1.9 bcf/d, roughly the size of LNG Canada’s Phase 1 facility in Kitimat.
- Another wave of projects is planned in coal-rich northwestern provinces.
There is no market-based justification for any of this. Global gas is abundant. LNG prices are at multi-year lows. Russia is preparing to funnel 5 bcf/d of pipeline gas into China. And the emissions profile of coal-derived gas is dramatically higher than producing conventional natural gas.
So why is China doing it?
Energy insecurity now overrides climate goals
The answer is blunt: energy insecurity in the era of U.S.–China strategic rivalry. Beijing is actively engineering a parallel energy system that cannot be disrupted by foreign governments or markets.
As a result, the country is willing to accept higher costs, higher emissions, and higher pollution to guarantee domestic control of supply. The People’s Daily has been signalling this priority shift for years, and the new CTG build-out makes the pivot unmistakable.
If China does not get the natural gas it needs from the world, it will make it from coal – even if the climate impact is vastly worse.
The myth collapses: gas is not “as bad as coal.” Coal-to-gas proves it
Opponents of Canadian LNG have long relied on the claim that natural gas is “as bad as coal” in emissions terms. It is an argument designed to sound scientific while avoiding the real comparisons: lifecycle intensity, upstream methane discipline, and the reality of what countries do when they lack access to reliable supply.
Now we have a case study that exposes the myth completely.
- Producing natural gas from conventional reservoirs – particularly in jurisdictions with strict methane control like Canada – is far less carbon-intensive than anything derived from coal.
- When China is willing to spend billions to turn coal into synthetic gas, it is doing so because gas is cleaner, more versatile, and more efficient, even when made through a dirtier pathway.
- The emissions footprint of coal-to-gas is orders of magnitude higher than LNG from Canada’s Montney.
The question is no longer whether gas is cleaner than coal. The question is whether Canada wants to be part of the global solution or leave a vacuum that will be filled by the dirtiest pathway imaginable.
Canada’s choice: supply the world – or watch the world choose the worst option
The lesson for Canada is direct.
China’s coal-to-gas surge should sharpen our national focus. Countries do not forgo energy. They substitute – often badly. If responsible suppliers like Canada sit on the sidelines, high-emission alternatives will win by default.
This isn’t an argument for abandoning climate goals; it is an argument for aligning them with physics, markets, and global behaviour. LNG Canada, Cedar LNG, Ksi Lisims, and the broader Montney resource are not theoretical climate debates. They are real projects that can displace the dirtiest fuels on Earth with cleaner Canadian alternatives.
If we want global emissions to fall, we need to compete, not retreat.
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