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 |  | | << Back to Wellhead | | Lawmakers aim bullets at oil, natural gas February 2010 | |
| Natural gas is the Butch Cassidy to crude oil’s Sundance Kid.
In the final moments of the 1969 film bearing the anti-heroes’ names, the titular characters emerge from hiding to face a hail of gunfire from the Bolivian cavalry.
It’s a moment of cinema history frozen in sepia hues, and it is now being re-enacted in political policy aimed at the nation’s energy industry.
The guns are now squarely aimed at oil and natural gas producers, February Wildcatter Wednesday speaker Keith Rattie said, and the Bolivian cavalry has been replaced by a political administration on the march for a green energy crusade.
Rattie, the chairman, president and CEO of Questar Corporation, became a rock star of sorts in the energy industry after his speech “Energy Myths and Realities” delivered at Utah Valley University’s Symposium on Environmental Ethics. In that presentation, Rattie was openly critical of the government’s efforts to thwart climate change, and during his Oklahoma City speech, he held no punches in explaining how the current administration will affect the energy industry.
“Our industry challenges go well beyond a recession, supply gut, weak demand and soft natural gas prices,” Rattie said. “In my 34-year career in this industry, I can not remember a time when so many issues have demanded our attention and action all at once.
“Politics and not markets are the biggest threat to our industry today.”
Rattie said the bullets fired toward oil and natural gas producers include the new taxes outlined in President Obama’s 2011 budget, EPA’s efforts to increase regulation on hydraulic fracturing, the Waxman-Markey bill that would institute a cap-and-trade policy, the push for “green jobs,” EPA’s endangerment finding that CO2 is a public health nuisance, and a number of oil and gas enemies holding high-ranking political positions, highlighted by Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar and his “kings of the world” statement.
Instead of attacking oil and natural gas, Rattie said, federal politicians should embrace the fossil fuels.
In 2009, the United States overtook Russia to become largest natural gas producer in the world, with American gas production growing by 2 percent despite a precipitous decline in prices.
Technological advancements and new discoveries means the United States has nearly a century’s worth of natural gas in proven reserves. Those reserves will grow, he added, as technology improves and new reserves are found.
Rattie said the increased promotion of wind and solar power for electricity generation over natural gas is misguided. Taken together, wind and solar account for less than one-half of 1 percent of America’s total energy use, but more than $30 billion in subsidies have been poured into the alternative fuel sources.
“You’ll hear it said and some will tell you wind and solar mandates are good for natural gas. They’ll argue that natural gas will be needed when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine,” Rattie said. “Don’t buy that... These mandates will capture market from natural gas and not coal and nuclear.
The abundance of natural gas found in the country could fuel the nation’s energy needs and aid in efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions, Rattie said, pointing out that CO2 emissions have actually declined since 2005, the benchmark year for most climate change legislation. That decline is as a result of a market-driven shift in the power market by substituting natural gas for coal.
“This should be a eureka moment,” Rattie said. “This should be cause for celebration for those who believe human CO2 emissions must be cut sharply to reduce the risk of global warming.
“If the goal of the U.S. energy policy, as President Obama puts it, is to reduce America’s dependence on imported oil, reduce CO2 emissions and create American jobs, then we must have greater use of American-made natural gas owned by Americans, produced by American workers from American companies who hire people in this country and pay American taxes. That should be the bedrock of energy policy.”
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