On Wednesday, April 11, AGA President and CEO Dave McCurdy and I traveled to New York to participate in the New York Times Energy for Tomorrow Conference . The day began with a stop at NBC Studios at 30 Rockefeller Plaza for an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” Because the anchors, Joe Kernen, Becky Quick and Andrew Ross Sorkin, were covering breaking news of an earthquake that struck near Indonesia, McCurdy’s interview was cut short, but he did get a chance to talk briefly about how customers are benefitting from low and stable gas prices. Watch it here:

Later in the day, McCurdy participated in the New York Times Energy for Tomorrow Conference, where everyone was talking about natural gas—from the responsible development of this abundant domestic resource to the role it should play in our nation’s energy portfolio.

The conference included a discussion of the presidential campaign with The New York Times’ political correspondents, a speech by Daniel Yergin, appearances by Carol Browner and T. Boone Pickens and a conversation between United States Secretary of Energy Dr. Steven Chu and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman.

The conference was a gathering of global leaders in energy and economics discussing the critical question of how to meet the world’s staggering energy needs, and in the afternoon, McCurdy joined a panel entitled “What do we do with natural gas?” moderated by New York Times Op-Ed columnist Joe Nocera. The lively discussion included Mark Brownstein, chief counsel of the Energy Program, Environmental Defense Fund, Michael Levi, senior fellow for energy and the environment, Council on Foreign Relations and Steve Mueller, president and CEO, Southwestern Energy Company. The conversation covered the gamut of issues about the safe and reliable delivery of clean natural gas and how it can help reach our national goals of improving our environment and increasing our energy security.

Watch the entire discussion here.

This was the warmest March in the United States going back to 1895, when National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) began collecting this data.  But for the winter heating season (November – March) the data is even more informative. Not only was it the warmest for this period in the United States since 1895, this result was not driven by one or two areas that were exceedingly warm –  it was a widespread warmth. Several regions (Northeast, East North Central, Central and Southeast) in the continental United States also had their warmest winter heating season since 1895. And nearly every other region (the West had its 70th warmest year) had a top 10 warmest recorded winter heating season.  It is usually big news if even one region sets a new warmest (or coldest) but to have this many simultaneously set new marks is unprecedented.

States that had their warmest heating degree day season this past winter include: Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont and Wisconsin.  Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia experienced their second warmest heating degree day season.

With a winter where the warmth was so widespread and extreme, it is no wonder that working gas in underground storage volumes are so high – 2,479 Bcf at the end of the winter heating season which was also a new “record”.  Meanwhile, the price of natural gas is the lowest it has been in a decade.

What will happen and what can do we do with all of this cheap gas?

The physical and financial natural gas market will find a balancing point and America’s natural gas utilities are always planning to meet customer needs for the next winter heating season.

There are also tremendous opportunities for consumers and our nation as a whole through increased applications of natural gas.  This includes the residential, commercial and industrial markets; manufacturing and electricity generation and natural gas vehicles.  AGA members are investing in upgrading infrastructure and new technologies that will benefit customers and help reach our national goals of improving our environment and increasing our energy security.

The American Gas Association (AGA) released its Preliminary Findings Concerning 2011 Natural Gas Reserves which estimates that U.S. natural gas producers found and replaced more gas than was consumed in 2011, thus reserves have continued to grow. We estimate that the national inventory of gas reserves is approximately 300 trillion cubic feet.  America’s abundance of natural gas is supported once more, as a likely contributor to continued price stability.

This ‘on-the-shelf’ inventory is the foundation along with growing national resource estimates that may point to as much as a 100 year natural gas supply in America.  This abundance is helping to reduce prices and increase stability for our customers and also ensuring that that natural gas is America’s domestic, clean foundation fuel for now and into the future.

Natural gas reserves, as measured in the AGA report, are those quantities of natural gas estimated to exist as the result of drilling and completion of existing wells.  Natural gas resources, assessed by groups such as the Potential Gas Committee, represent a broader definition of all natural gas in-place that may be considered as future supply, including gas yet to be discovered. When periodic assessments of undiscovered resources are combined with proved reserves a vision of future supply of natural gas emerges. Today, the combination of reserves information and resource assessments places that future supply at 2,100 Tcf or greater.  That represents about 100 years of supply at current gas production rates, which are 22-23 Tcf per year.

The previous domestic reserves record of 293 Tcf was recorded in1967.  During 2010 and now again for 2011, the American Gas Association estimates that more than 100 percent of total domestic annual production was replaced with new natural gas reserve additions and revisions of previous estimates. AGA estimates that proved U.S. reserves may be as high as 300 Tcf, today, a new reserves record.

AGA and its members believe that our domestic natural gas resource base must be developed responsibly. We are committed to the continued safe and reliable extraction, transport and delivery of natural gas to consumers.

A utility line is damaged by digging once every three minutes nationwide.  One-third of these incidents are caused by failure to call 811 before beginning a digging project.

America’s natural gas utilities urge you to call 811 before you dig.

This April marks the fifth annual National Safe Digging Month, an initiative put in place by the Common Ground Alliance (CGA) to remind professionals and homeowners of the importance of following safe digging procedures.  AGA has been a proud sponsor of the CGA ever since its inception in 2000. AGA member utilities are committed to promoting safe digging practices to help ensure public safety.

Throughout the month, your local natural gas utilities and others will be raising awareness in your community about the importance of safe digging.

When calling 811, the individual is automatically connected to the local one-call center which collects information about the digging project. The one-call center then transmits this information to the appropriate utility companies who will send representatives to mark the locations of underground lines in the immediate vicinity of the planned work location.

Additional information can be found at http://www.call811.com/

Striking a single line can cause injury, repair costs, fines and outages. Every digging project – even small projects like installing a mailbox, building a deck or planting a tree or garden – warrants a call to 811.