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Who is the American Gas Association?
Filed under: Natural Gas, energy, welcome
“You think you know me well/Well, you don’t know me.” – You Don’t Know Me by (“The Genius”) Ray Charles
At the American Gas Association (AGA), which represents the natural gas distribution segment of the natural gas industry, we know how Ray Charles felt because as omnipresent as our members are in Americans’ lives, most people don’t know us at all.
Part of the problem is our name. Many people hear “gas” association and automatically think of gasoline. Maybe some years back we should have changed our name to the American Natural Gas Association, and maybe someday in the future we will. But for now the best we can do is explain patiently that we represent natural gas utilities, which have nothing to do with gasoline or the oil that is refined into gasoline.
Another problem is that we are closely connected, at least in the public’s mind – and too often in Congress’ mind – with the energy producing segment of the industry, as in the “oil and gas” industry. It’s almost one word, the “oilandgas” industry, as if we were joined at the hip. That mistaken perception is certainly enhanced by the trade association that does represent the major energy producers, the American Petroleum Institute, or API, which has run a gazillion ads that state those ads are sponsored by “the people of America’s oil and natural gas industry.” Yes, the producers API represents produce natural gas as well as oil, but AGA does not represent the oil or natural gas producing community, which, in addition to API, is represented by several other producer-focused associations at the state and local level.
We represent that local natural gas utility down the street or across town – the one that delivers natural gas for home heating, water heating, cooking and other end-use applications to more than 70 million homes and businesses throughout the United States.
Why is clearing up this confusion about who we are so important to us? For one thing, when the price of energy, be it gasoline or natural gas, skyrockets, the media, the general public and, once again, members of Congress, assume our members are raking in the dough. Actually, by law, natural gas utilities can’t make one penny of profit on the natural gas commodity they deliver to customers - what they pay suppliers for natural gas is what they charge customers. So high prices hurt utilities as well as customers because more customers have trouble paying their energy bills.
Rather, our members make their money by charging a fee for the delivery, and maintenance, of the natural gas pipeline system in which they deliver natural gas to the customer. In that sense, we’re more like UPS or FedEx than API. Our members are delivery vehicles.
We are AGA. Every day, 70 million customers – which adds up to 171 million Americans – receive clean-burning natural gas safely and reliably from our 202 natural gas utility members. Hopefully, now you know us.
Natural Gas Council Appeals to Senator Bingaman on Energy Legislation
A group of U.S. natural gas associations has written a letter to Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, to call attention to problematic provisions in the “energy efficiency resource standards” (EERS) included in Senate and House energy bills that are pending on Capitol Hill right now. While the end result is a laudable one, the National Gas Council (NGC) is mainly concerned with the uncertainty contained in the current EERS language.
The Natural Gas Council, comprised of the American Gas Association, the Natural Gas Supply Association, the Interstate Natural Gas Association, and the Independent Petroleum Association of America, pointed out to the senator that the mandate for new energy consumption reduction goals for natural gas customers seems to rely on large, after-the-fact penalties rather than incentives. These penalties are tied to consumer behavior, which utilities can neither control nor dictate, but which monetarily punish utilities when customers fail to meet the reduction goals. The Council is optimistic that this Congress will draft legislation that will help reduce the nation’s energy and carbon intensity through a mechanism that is clear and predictable, and one that takes into account its impact on those entities already working to increase energy efficiency.
Read what the group had to say here.
A Saudi Royal Talks About Oil … Independence
It’s not often that a member of the Saudi royal family agrees with me, but in January I posted a blog that said “energy independence” wasn’t feasible and claiming America could achieve it wasn’t desirable. And now Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal, a former Saudi ambassador to Washington DC, has told editors and reporters at The Washington Times the exact same thing.
“Politicians, when they do that (claim energy independence is achievable), I think they are misleading their publics,” Prince Turki said.
He is right, and while many people will think Prince Turki is being self serving – the Saudis are, after all, the world’s largest oil producers – the fact is that the American public would not stand for the energy price increases that would result if we somehow managed to quickly wean ourselves off of oil or natural gas imports and relied on renewable energy as our dominant energy supply source. Currently renewable energies such as wind and solar – which are far more expensive than the three major fossil fuels, coal, oil and natural gas – meet about 2 percent of our domestic energy needs.
But the larger point is that energy independence is the wrong goal. Energy security is the proper goal and to achieve that we need more, not less, diversity of supply. That means we need as many kinds of energy supplies as possible, including more liquefied natural gas (LNG), and we need as many suppliers as possible. In other words, to achieve energy security, we need to establish a global energy industry in which as many buyers interact with as many sellers as possible.
Another problem is that when our politicians talk about achieving “energy independence,” it isn’t just the public they mislead. It is also the suppliers. In an interview with American Gas magazine, global energy expert and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Daniel Yergin points out that, on the one hand our political leaders continually encourage energy producers such as the Saudis to increase their energy production and exports, while on the other hand these same politicians keep talking about energy independence. “That is a confusing message for energy-producing nations,” Yergin says.
He is right, too.
A Saudi Prince, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and me. Some days (to coin a phrase) this job is a “gas.”
True Blue Natural Gas Blog from the American Gas Association (AGA)- Utah Clean Cities Coalition and Questar Gas open new fueling station in Utah
- Natural Gas Roundtable: Caruso and Hatley
- Focus on Low-Carbon Solutions
- Congrats to Alagasco on their expanding natural gas fleet
- Natural Gas Market Indicators
- Spectra Responds to Natural Gas Pipeline Concerns
- Don’t Miss Out—Make Sure to Register for the World Shale Gas Conference & Exposition
- Dave Parker Receives Prestigious Key Award from ASAE and The Center
- Department of Energy proposes to use full-fuel-cycle analyses in developing energy efficiency standards
- High dividend tax rates will negatively impact utilities
