The release of methane from coal production, storage and transit accounts for less than 8% of total methane emissions in the US. 24% comes from natural gas production, storage and transit. The tanks and pipe lines are far from “air tight”, even if they meet industry defined standards for the term. Source for EPA numbers on emissions if you are curious
The idea of gas power plants as a supplementary system to pick up the slack is a sham, the vast majority of gas generator capacity being built does not shut down when non-emitting systems can meet demand. Especially in the context of replacing coal plants with gas plants. These are base load plants, not peaker plants.
Every time we build a new base load gas plant to replace a coal plant, we’re locking our selves into burning and leaking methane for another 30 years. Something we can not afford to be doing given that we can not wait 30 years to reach net zero emissions, even 20 years is a catastrophe.