Increased use of natural gas has been widely credited with having reduced U.S. carbon dioxide emissions in recent years. But the new study, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, finds that between 2013 and 2055 the use of natural gas could reduce cumulative emissions from the electricity sector by no more than 9 percent, a reduction the authors say will have an insignificant impact on climate. The power sector accounts for around a third of U.S. emissions.

The researchers—from the University of California, Irvine; Stanford University; and the nonprofit organization Near Zero—examined varying combinations of natural gas supply and climate policies. In some scenarios, they found that use of natural gas would actually boost emissions from the power sector