World's natural gas need highlighted

Apr. 1—The world has woefully dragged its feet on meeting the necessity of natural gas and the American Petroleum Institute and Odessa oilman Kirk Edwards say it not only should but must get going.

Noting that the API had just called on the United States and the other G7 nations to heavily invest in liquefied natural gas facilities and make other upgrades, Edwards said, "It's critically important that we get the world in general to realize that natural gas is vital.

"Most of these G7 countries, including the U.S., have been overstressing reliance on solar and wind power, but I think everybody has come to realize from the Russian invasion of Ukraine how important natural gas is to the energy sector, especially when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow."

Edwards said Monday that the tax incentives that have been devoted to promoting solar and wind power "could go a long way toward helping these countries be confident and comfortable that their energy supplies will be there when they want them" by developing all aspects of energy production.

"We will need all sorts of energy moving ahead, including natural gas, oil and the renewables," said Edwards, who is one of the largest natural gas producers in the Panhandle. "It's got to be a smart blend with each of these, especially with Russia and China and how they're feeling about Ukraine right now.

"It has been an eye-opener for the world to see how important natural gas is."

The G7 members are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the U.S. and the European Union.

API President-CEO Mike Sommers said from Washington, D.C., that his organization and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce had just called on Japanese Prime Minister-G7 Chair Fumio Kishida and his group "to expeditiously act on policies to ensure that the international commitments to replace Russian natural gas are achieved.

"The signatories of our letter stressed the importance of natural gas and LNG in meeting shared energy security and climate objectives," Sommers said. "The energy and financial reverberations of the war have shown that these goals cannot be achieved without fundamental progress on both energy security and climate change.

"Responsible development of natural gas and associated infrastructure is critical to this progress and we look forward to working with the G7 ministers and heads of state to ensure that forthcoming meetings reflect these realities."

The API's initiative followed a meeting between industry leaders and G7 representatives during the recent Cambridge Energy Research Associates Week Conference in Houston.

"Our energy security forum discussion emphasized the importance of building on the G7's June 2022 statement recognizing the important role that increased deliveries of LNG can play in phasing out dependency on Russian energy and that investment in this sector is necessary in response to the current crisis," Sommers said.

He said the first priority should be to work with industry and encourage public and private investment in all segments of the natural gas supply chain and ensure sufficient development and availability of non-Russian supplies while ensuring consistency with long-term climate objectives.

Sommers said G7 should also cooperate on ways to improve guidelines and practices associated with the public financing of natural gas infrastructure and foster the efficient and timely review of permitting of such infrastructure.

Additionally, he said, it "should support the development of gas resources including bio-methane, renewable natural gas and other renewable and low carbon gaseous fuels."

Other signers of the letter to Kishida were representatives of the Asia Natural Gas & Energy Association, Energy Policy Research Foundation, Eurogas, the International Association of Oil & Gas Producers, the International Gas Union and the LNG Allies.