Dear Sierra Club, Do You Take This U.S. Natural Gas Industry? An Unexpected Union
The Sierra Club has come out for the U.S. natural gas industry, and not for imported natural gas: The organization is supporting domestic production, as it would also like to see U.S. energy independence, says Carl Pope, executive director.
Pope visited with industry leaders in Houston recently and spoke to Oil and Gas Investor magazine. View the video and the entire transcript: Oil and Gas Investor’s Interview With The Sierra Club’s Carl Pope.
The Sierra Club is so opposed to coal as a fuel source that it has come out in support of U.S. natural gas, according to Pope’s comments. It still favors renewable fuels—solar and wind—more than fossil fuels, but among fossil fuels, it favors natural gas, says Pope, who became executive director of the roughly 700,000-member organization in 1992 and has seen some 150,000 members added during that time. Pope has been on the Sierra Club staff for some 30 years.
Pope says, “There’s a lot of opportunity—people in the natural gas industry tell me—to produce more natural gas domestically by using new technologies, and we’re in favor of that.”
As for LNG, “taking a bunch of natural gas from Indonesia and moving it to the United States is intrinsically not terribly efficient, so we would rather see what we can do with domestic production here in the United States before we start substituting imported natural gas for imported oil.”
Will the Sierra Club assist the natural gas industry in getting its message before Congress?
Pope says, “Our primary message to Congress is to say we need to end the system in which fuels like coal and oil that do a lot of damage to the environment actually get subsidized for the damage they do, and fuels like gas and renewables that don’t do that kind of damage actually don’t face a level playing field. So, our message to Congress is that we ought to level the playing field…Right now both renewables and natural gas are facing a playing field that is not fair, and our message is to Congress is “’Let’s have a fair playing field.’”
The industry gathering at which Pope made his remarks included Aubrey McClendon, chairman and chief executive of Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake Energy Corp., and a Top 5 U.S. gas reserves-holder. Less than 10% of Chesapeake’s production is oil, and 100% of Chesapeake’s targeted long-term production is natural gas.
McClendon became vociferous in 2007 against the coal industry, prompted by a Texas electric-power producer’s plan to build more than a dozen new coal-powered plants, and is the founder and chairman of American Clean Skies Foundation, a public-education and political lobbying organization that argues for non-polluting fuel sources, including natural gas.
The Sierra Club has been well known in the oil and gas industry as taking a contrarian view of energy policy on the ground—contrarian to that of the oil and gas industry. The organization is now taking policy to the air—air quality, that is—and sees eye-to-eye with the U.S. natural gas industry—at least.
– Nissa Darbonne, Executive Editor, Oil and Gas Investor, A&D Watch and Oil and Gas Investor This Week, ndarbonne@hartenergy.com
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March 5th, 2008 at 9:50 am
I can see the Earth Liberation Front standing up and saying “I object to this union!”
Still, it’s nice to see an organization such as Sierra Club come around in gas’ favor. And for a good cause, too. Coal should only be used to power locomotives and be handed out to bad children on Christmas.
March 5th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
you might not publish my response, but, i wanted to say it anyway.
First, of all the US will NEVER be energy independent, as long as hummer, taunting, environmentally unfriendly texans are around.
Two, no disrespect to Pope, but is that the same argument that is being used by my colleagues , “we can make cleaner and cheaper fuel if we invest in the technologies”.?
and lastly, lets call a spade a spade ok, if the government removes or lowers the supplement now recieved by oil and gas companies, you know what will happen. let me tell you $6 oil.. plain and simple.
March 10th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
As was stated, natural gas is our clean fuel, but so much of this fuel is being wasted. 20% or more of the energy that is created during the combustion of this “clean” burning fuel is lost up chimney’s all across this country, and around the world. That is a lot of wasted energy!
Large facilities like hospitals, universities and prisons use a tremendous amount of natural gas to heat the building spaces and also to heat the domestic water used for showers and bathing, washing floors and dishes and also to do laundry.
The food and beverage industries require a lot of natural gas to produce steam to process and produce these items and there is the textile industries that manufacture clothing or even carpet for in your homes.
A lot of these facilities and industries operate around the clock, constantly consuming large volumes of natural gas to provide our necessities.
As a nation we are looking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. How many tons of emissions would be reduced if these facilities and industries were to increase their natural gas energy efficiency by 10 to 15%?
It’s not rocket science. The technology to make this happen has been available for over 20 years, but when natural gas was relativly cheep, and there was no talk about greenhouse gas emissions, who cared about how efficient these large natural gas consuming appliances were?
The time is coming to look at applying this energy saving technology.
The “low hanging fruit” has been picked.
Here is a question to those involved in Green or LEED buildings, or those States that are dealing with or thinking about future water issues.
Have you ever seen natural gas irrigate the lawns and flower beds?
Check it out. If natural gas is used as efficient as is possible, it can and will give you added benefits.