As the nation’s oil and gas producers face increased regulations and negative public sentiment, they were urged to seek support from non-traditional sources.
“We don’t do a good job of talking to the industries that help us,” Dan Naatz, chief operating officer and executive vice president, Independent Petroleum Association of America, told attendees at the Permian Basin Regulatory Seminar.
Service companies, railroads, manufacturers, construction companies all rely on the oil and gas industry, he said as he opened the annual conference presented by Midland College’s Petroleum Professional Development Center and the Permian Basin Petroleum Association.
“We need to talk to them instead of talking to ourselves,” Naatz continued. “We don’t make an effort because we think they don’t care, they just want cheap gas, or because they don’t understand what we do. We need to tell them what it means if government actions stop the Permian Basin, if government action stops offshore production.”
The choices made today regarding energy policy will have an impact on US and global economies for years, he warned.
“We are at an inflection point: Will we have energy choices or will we have energy constraints?” he asked.
As the IPAA continues to advocate for independent oil and natural gas producers, Naatz said the association is closely watching events in what he called a capitol “on a razor’s edge” of stalemate of a House and Senate almost evenly split between the two political parties.
The budget deficit and current face-off over the debt ceiling is a top concern, with Naatz noting that interest payments on the debt will soon be the largest line item in the nation’s budget, overshadowing defense spending. The impact could be huge, he said.
Secondly, IPAA continues to pursue permitting reform, particularly of programs like the National Environmental Policy Act and Endangered Species Act. Receiving permits for anything from drilling on federal lands to production facilities to pipelines has become challenging, he said. And changes are needed to litigation regulations “so every project isn’t tied up in the courts.”
Renewable energy companies are finding they’re coming up against the same challenges the oil and gas industry has faced, he said.
He said the IPAA is also working with agencies it hasn’t worked with in the past – like the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is planning regulations to require companies to disclose the financial impact of climate change on their operations.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, he said the tone seems to have changed as the realization that oil and gas is vital to national security, energy security, even global security sets in.
“The shale revolution turned the US into an energy superpower. Without shale, we would be in a very different position (after the invasion),” Naatz said. “The policy decisions made today – we’re at an inflection point as to where we go and how we get there – are we going to be smart about increasing oil and gas production? Are we going to be smart about finding new energy sources? We’re part of that solution.”
Read More: Oil and gas needs to broaden base of support