Because it's false? Nothing is emissions-free: making solar panels and wind turbines create emissions, and since they are all made in China, just transporting them around the world where they are used cause emissions as well. And when they become garbage they are shipped once more around the world to be disposed (and not recycled). So it's only "emissions-free" if you ignore the whole supply chain.
Actually, burning natural gas does result in emissions of nearly all types of air pollutants and carbon dioxide (CO2).
About 117 pounds of CO2 are produced per million British thermal units (MMBtu) equivalent of natural gas compared with more than 200 pounds of CO2 per MMBtu of coal and more than 160 pounds per MMBtu of distillate fuel oil.
Source: https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/natural-gas/natural-gas-...
The article also specifically says that natural gas is not emissions-free: "The explosive growth of natural gas in the US has been a big environmental win, since it creates the least particulate pollution of all the fossil fuels, as well as the lowest carbon emissions per unit of electricity. But its use is going to need to start dropping soon if the US is to meet its climate goals, so it will be critical to see whether its growth flat lines over the next few years."
Everybody (one would hope) understands that about coal, oil, and natural gas.
Many people (it seems) overlook that for wind, solar, and battery technology.
It's akin to ignoring | being wilfully ignorant of what happens to material in the recycle bin.
Think of it more as a plea to remember that all this clean energy comes with a boatload of waste that needs addressing, that is often in other people's backyards, and the you don't get $64 billion US worth of copper without the digging up of what some consider to be sacred ground.
What is the action this realization is supposed to help us come to though? Should we stop the transition to cleaner energy until we find a 100% clean energy source throughout its life cycle before we begin the transition? It is simple really. Wind, solar, and so on are cleaner than fossil fuel sources of energy, so we should gradually transition to them. Cleaner mining and responsible recycling and reuse of the infra we build can be worked on over time.
In another 50 years we will have a pile of toxic waste as a direct result of scaling solar and wind up from the sliver it is now to enough to replace fossil fuels in world electricty production and replace fossil fuels in transport and build out enough batteries to ride out at least 10 hours of global demand.
> Cleaner mining and responsible recycling and reuse of the infra we build can be worked on over time.
How's that going so far - I can point to a few examples of mine reclaimation .. these are dwarfed by the majority that are left as problems for later on.
It's simple really, high consumers should consume less and as resources are used there should be focus on remediation and harm reduction from the outset.
Typically the worst offenders greenwash the nasty away and tut-tut about waste piling up in third world | southernn economies.
High grade bullshit stated with confidence.
Based on cursory checks of https://ourworldindata.org/energy, https://www.statista.com/statistics/668749/regional-distribu..., whatever sources they use.