The U.S. gas infrastructure network consists of thousands of miles of connected pipelines and storage facilities that help provide reliable, and affordable forms of energy in today’s energy systems. Currently, the infrastructure network is primarily used to supply the U.S. economy with natural gas molecules that represents nearly a third of the country's energy consumption (Source: EIA, 2022). Pipeline companies also delivered 75% of the natural gas used to generate electric power in the U.S. in 2023. With electricity demand continuing to increase significantly, understanding how to maintain, upgrade and modernize this extensive infrastructure network will be an important lever in energy system transitions.

Repurposing this infrastructure for the transition of energy systems is important because it reduces the need for new infrastructure development saving time, costs and minimizing new environmental impacts. Upgrading existing infrastructure can accelerate the deployment of emerging low-carbon fuels and decarbonization solutions, while also stimulating job creation and economic growth by leveraging the expertise and skills of the current workforce.

• Regional solutions. Each region will adopt a unique set of solutions based on their existing infrastructure, fuel opportunities, market drivers, and community priorities.
• Low-emission gases. Existing pipeline infrastructure will increasingly be decarbonized through reduced emissions, blending, sequestration, and moving lower-emission molecules.
• Strategic carbon management. Future energy systems will continue to have emissions, but those remaining will be strategic, based on technological and cost considerations.
• Meaningful and transparent emissions offsets. Remaining emissions will be carefully offset through credible and transparent sequestration solutions.
• A range of energy sources and carriers. Energy systems will need to meet a range of requirements including affordability, reliability, resiliency, and sustainability. To achieve this, there will be a multitude of energy sources and carriers available, enabling customized solutions and redundancy.
• A partner in systems integration and interdependency. Today’s gas infrastructure is critical in meeting unprecedented energy demand and supporting the growth of electrification. Energy systems will be integrated and interdependent, allowing for redundancy.
• Resilience. As today’s system is repurposed, expanded, and refined, it will be strengthened to withstand the increased frequency and intensity of severe weather events, natural disasters, and security threats.

RAISE’s research and analysis will be grounded in a broad systems perspective, considering myriad sectors and segments of the energy value chain, and multiple technology options.

In some regional cases and over certain time scales, RAISE may identify pathways that include continued natural gas use where emerging technologies do not result in significantly lower-carbon intensity at reasonable cost and speed.

We acknowledge that this will be a contentious research output to certain stakeholders, which is why RAISE aims to make all its technical analysis and research work publicly available. It is also why we have built this initiative as a multi-stakeholder collaboration with investors, environmental NGOs, and academics to ensure our research is transparent, objective and credible. RAISE’s research aims to identify and incorporate key differences across regions in the U.S. and identify fit-for-purpose solutions for evolving policy and technology trends.