A giant natural gas pipeline is the biggest story in Arizona that we all ignored | Opinion

Article originally posted on AZ Central on August 7, 2025

Sometimes the general public is scarcely aware of the biggest stories breaking in their own backyard.

That is happening this week, as Arizona plants a stake in the future, declaring to the world that we will be a player in the modern economy.

If you are going to seriously compete in tomorrow’s economy, you are going to need energy and lots of it.

The world is on the cusp of what many say is the next industrial revolution, and the electricity needed to power breakthroughs in advanced manufacturing and computing will be enormous.

This week, Arizona’s major utilities told the world we’re in.

Arizona’s energy demand is growing rapidly

Arizona Public Service Co., Salt River Project, Tucson Electric Power Co. and UniSource Electric Services announced they have lined up behind a $5.3 billion project to build a new pipeline to deliver natural gas from the Permian Basin of West Texas to the major population centers of Arizona.

Albuquerque-based Transwestern Pipeline Co. will construct the 600-mile pipeline that is scheduled for completion in 2029, The Arizona Republic’s Sasha Hupka reports.

For Arizonans, it means another reliable source of power to keep our homes cool in summer even as temperatures rise in a time of climate change and historic drought.

More importantly, it means Arizona is getting in front of the vast rise in energy demand that is coming.

On July 9, Arizona Public Service, the state’s largest utility with 1.4 million customers, set an all-time record for power demand of 8,527 megawatts.

The utility estimates that by 2027, its customers will need 11,350 megawatts, the Phoenix Business Journal reports.

Solar doesn’t yet deliver 24/7 power

The so-called Desert Southwest expansion project will include 516 miles of 42-inch pipeline and nine compressor stations in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, announced Dallas-based Energy Transfer, which will operate the system.

“This project is more than a pipeline,” Arizona Chamber President and CEO Danny Seiden told the Business Journal. “It’s a signal to job creators that Arizona is serious about staying competitive, attracting investment and building a resilient energy future.”

It says Arizona is living in the real world, in which base-load power is still a necessity as the country and globe gradually convert to renewables.

Intermittent sources such as solar and wind are not yet reliable for a steady, unbreaking supply of power, given the vagaries of weather. One day, batteries are expected to change that, but the technology for large-scale use is years away, explains the Ohio-based North Central Electric Cooperative.

The world is waking up to the fact that even after all the doomsday activism and push for renewables over decades, fossil fuels, such as natural gas, still account for 83% of total energy consumption, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Renewables make up just 8.8% of that consumption, the agency reports.

Like it or not, we still need fossil fuels

In western Europe, where some countries went wild decarbonizing their grid to try to hit Net Zero, they face the cold reality that they greatly hobbled their economies and needlessly raised rates through the roof on average ratepayers.

This awakening is symbolically depicted this week in an Economist cover story and illustration that shows ropes pulling down a giant industrial windmill.

“Reaching net zero in the nearish future would require emission cuts to be quick, deep — and painful,” The Economist reports.

“For countries which have not yet seen any decline in emissions — which, worldwide, is most of them — the steepest cuts would have to come very early. In many cases such scenarios are barely physically imaginable, let alone politically feasible.

“If a target is so hard that it cannot win consent, then it needs to be changed.”

Arizona bet big on natural gas to keep the AC on

In America, Democrats are also awaking to the fact that their Inconvenient Truths and Green New Deals were sometimes fantasy.

“There’s no way around it: The left strategy on climate needs to be rethought,” Jody Freeman, who served as counselor for energy and climate change in President Barack Obama’s White House, told Politico.

“We’ve lost the culture war on climate, and we have to figure out a way for it to not be a niche leftist movement.”

Freeman told the website she is “struggling” to articulate a new strategy, but it includes natural gas as a “bridge fuel” to more renewable power.

This week Arizona is facing reality and betting big on natural gas to help power the future.

It’s not a story most Arizonans care about. We’ve come to depend that when we flip the switch our lights will go on and our central air will keep us cool.

We live in a desert, people. None of that happens without massive pre-planning.

This week, that forward vision is the story.