Coalbed methane used to be a deadly threat to coal miners. In the 1950s and 1960s natural gas was routinely flared as an unwanted by-product of oil production. Gas from shales and tight sands, once spurned as too difficult to produce, is now the future for many domestic producers. And methane hydrates lie beneath the world’s oceans waiting for technology to free them while liquefied natural gas (LNG) tankers ply the waves above.

Clearly, the gas industry has come a long way, former Oklahoma Corporation Commission (OCC) member Denise Bode told NGI, but to go further the industry needs an advocate in the form of a think tank that can relieve people, particularly lawmakers, of the “urban myths” they hold about the clean-burning fuel. Bode was recently picked by Aubrey McClendon, CEO of gas producer Chesapeake Energy, to head the newly formed American Clean Skies Foundation (see NGI, April 30), a group she hopes will become the brain trust behind the gas industry’s further evolution.

“We want to be the think tank for natural gas,” Bode said. “We’ll be focused on energy from a gas perspective as opposed to focused on gas from an oil perspective or a coal perspective.”

Washington, DC-based Clean Skies, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, comes to a table at which lobbyists and think-tankers from the oil patch are well represented. Bode herself is a past president of the Independent Petroleum Association of America. Additionally, the American Gas Association (AGA) and Natural Gas Supply Association are well established organizations. Still, Bode said, the gas industry has only seen one major public education campaign, and that was mounted about 15 years ago by the AGA.

“I think the principal purpose of the American Clean Skies Foundation is to begin to educate the public on the facts and figures and dispel urban myths about natural gas,” she said. “It’s even more timely right now as the public is paying attention to energy and the cost of energy.”

And that’s not to mention the coal lobby. McClendon, from whose pockets the foundation’s initial funding has come and who is its chairman, has been a vocal opponent of coal-fired power generation, first in Texas (see NGI, Dec. 4, 2006) and most recently in his home state of Oklahoma, where Chesapeake is one member of a consortium fighting a new coal-fired plant (see NGI, July 2). Earlier this year Chesapeake helped fund a now-canceled ad campaign whose tag line was “Face it, coal is dirty.”

As McClendon has said previously, Bode stressed that Clean Skies is about the virtues of gas and not the vices of coal. “It won’t be ‘coal is filthy’ and those kind of things,” Bode said. “It will be facts and yardsticks and differentiation [of gas from coal and oil]. It won’t be negative.”

Still, while singing the praises of gas Bode isn’t shy about noting the hullabaloo around coal-fired generation, particularly when it’s “clean” coal.

“I’m elbowing my way into the discussion,” she said. “There’s been advertising and promotion of so-called clean coal technology and billions of dollars are being proposed to go to these new technologies that are not even half as clean as what we already have [in natural gas]. The oil industry has been very active in promoting the oil industry through advertising and promotions.

“Nobody’s talking about clean-burning natural gas. I just consider ourselves trying to elbow our way into a discussion that’s been ongoing where much money has already been spent and much lobbying and advocacy has already been done and we’re just the little guy trying to get our facts out there and be heard. It’s critically important for America that we be heard because we are a solution that can really change the air that we breathe.”

Bode, a Republican, has been involved in energy policy for more than 30 years and claims she “can tell you where every body is buried on energy and the environment over that period.” In her early years she was a Senate aide during the Carter administration. Bode left the OCC to lead Clean Skies at the end of May. She currently co-hosts a radio program on energy called “Energy Matters” along with radio personality Ron Black, who bills himself as “the 400-pound media gorilla.” Her natural gas advocacy plans include wider distribution of the radio program.

The foundation, whose website is www.americancleanskies.com, just got an Internet connection at its office last week, Bode said. Right now, McClendon is stumping for members. “We’re in the stage where we’re putting the materials together for him to take out and sign people up,” Bode said. “We’re a baby organization in the formative stages.”

While McClendon scouts for like-minded gas fans, one of Bode’s tasks will be to form alliances with academics who can help the foundation with new research and the compilation of existing data on natural gas and energy in general. Additionally, alliances with environmental organizations are certainly not out of the question, Bode said. “To be practical, they are going to be a critical part of our footprint.”

On an issue such as limiting carbon emissions, Bode said Clean Skies will not be taking a position for cap-and-trade as opposed to a carbon tax or any similar stance, for example. “Our analysis of [the issue] and our information that we provide could be utilized by policymakers in making their decision,” she said. “We’re not going to lobby; that’s up to the trade groups.”

Since Clean Skies was founded by a domestic gas producer, one might expect LNG to be a tough topic for Bode to navigate. While touting America’s abundance of domestic gas supplies as well as those from Canada and potentially from Mexico, she readily praises LNG imports for lessening gas price volatility. “We don’t want to limit the discussion to domestic natural gas, although we think it makes a lot of sense to use the resources that we have available here in America.”

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