An article written by George Monbiot in The Guardian does a good job of explaining why we should not celebrate new fossil fuel discoveries, why peak oil is a climate danger if it encourages the use of unconventional fuels, and why governments serious about climate change need to be leaving fossil fuels underground:

But whether we burn filthy unconventional fuels or slightly less filthy oil and gas, beyond a certain point they will tip us beyond a critical level of global warming. Most governments identify this as 2C. Several game-changing papers published in Nature last year suggest that even if we were to burn no unconventional fossil fuels, we can afford to use only 60% of current reserves of oil, gas and coal if we’re to prevent the global average temperature from rising by more than 2C.

In other words, if governments are serious about climate change, then far from encouraging the expansion of supplies, they should be deciding which 40% or more of current reserves they are going to leave in the ground. Current policy suggests that they are not serious about climate change.

Monbiot has long been ahead of the curve, as a journalist reporting on climate change. Hopefully, the logic of leaving fossil fuels unburned will spread into the wider societal discourse, eventually becoming the subject of public demands for action.