DEPA PRESS RELEASE – JANUARY 22, 2021
You may not have heard, but people are freezing around the world -RIGHT NOW – due to frigid temperatures and a lack of affordable, reliable energy – like the natural gas that heats most U.S. homes. Not just direct gas-fired heat, but according to the Energy Information Administration, natural gas is the #1 source for generating electricity in the U.S. What is the Biden/Harris Administration’s response? It looks like they got together and said, how can we make this worse and be sure that every American has the opportunity to experience a lack of or cost-prohibitive energy. And who will suffer first and the most? Our low income and disadvantaged communities. Just think for a moment, who is hit hardest with a rise in gasoline prices or increased cost of heating and air conditioning and other energy? The poorest among us!
In the First couple of days in office, Biden/Harris have reentered the Paris climate agreement, imposed a moratorium on oil and gas leasing on federal lands, and canceled the Keystone XL pipeline. These actions are an all-out assault on American energy independence.
Look at the potential impact the federal moratorium may have on just one state. According to the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association, the oil and gas industry supports more than 134,000 jobs and $16.6 billion in annual economic activity. Taxes and royalties from the industry account for 33% of the State of New Mexico’s annual budget, including almost $1.4 billion for public schools.
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DEPA PRESS RELEASE – JANUARY 22, 2021 – PAGE 2
The Paris agreement will impose costs and emission reductions in the U.S. and other western countries, but the Chinese aren’t required to modify anything until 2030. Want to bet what China will do in 2030 if they decide coal is the cheapest way to fuel their growing need for power in their manufacturing industry? My money says it will be to keep building coal plants. In the meantime, we have lost more of our critical manufacturing and the reshoring of U.S. manufacturing jobs.
The Keystone XL is simply the most environmentally friendly way to move Canadian oil from Alberta to the Gulf Coast for refining. To pretend otherwise is simply pandering to environmental groups. It doesn’t take a genius to know that pipes are safer, cheaper, and more environmentally positive than rail or trucks. The desire to “keep it in the ground” is out weighting science, logic, and responsible environmental stewardship. This action will also take an economic toll costing untold numbers of jobs in the U.S. and Canada, including union construction jobs.
To quote Congressman Scalise from Louisiana, “This harmful action by President Biden, on just his first full day in office, threatens the economic livelihoods of millions of American families, and should be immediately reversed. The last thing we need in the middle of a global pandemic is more unemployed Americans and higher energy costs for families who are already struggling. Energy made in America creates jobs, lowers the cost of gas and electricity for all American families and small businesses, and advances American interests on the world stage.” We couldn’t agree more!
DEPA PRESS RELEASE – SEPTEMBER 23, 2020
The Domestic Energy Producers Alliance (DEPA) sent the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) leadership a letter today calling on the Agency to scale back and reconsider entirely the de facto Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) mandate under the federal Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). The RFS RNG mandate interferes with the free market and unnaturally incentivizes the replacement of geologic natural gas with renewable gas in natural gas vehicles. Created from methane captured at landfills, RNG qualifies as a cellulosic biofuel under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). This means, while it is much cheaper to produce than natural gas, RNG used in natural gas vehicles receives a massive subsidy – which can be as high as $1.80 an ethanol equivalent gallon in 2020 – to directly replace geologic natural gas in the transportation sector.
DEPA appreciates the Administration’s efforts to make America energy self-sufficient and the world’s number one producer of crude oil and natural gas. We believe the RNG mandate should be reduced in the 2021 RFS and seek advanced rulemaking to rescind RNG’s approval for the cellulosic biofuel category of the RFS.
In 2014 EPA allowed landfill gas to qualify as a cellulosic biofuel under RFS. RNG is now used to meet nearly the entirety of the cellulosic biofuel mandate and EPA has increased this RNG mandate by an average of almost 40% annually for each of the last five years. Cellulosic RFS credits were as high as $1.67 per gallon earlier this year. DEPA believes this subsidy is unnecessary and unfair in the natural gas marketplace.
These measures are necessary to ensure a competitive American natural gas vehicle market that maximizes consumer choice, while minimizing fuel costs.
DEPA PRESS RELEASE – AUGUST 14, 2020
The Domestic Energy Producers Alliance (DEPA) supports the Environmental Protection Agency’s action to modify air emissions regulations affecting oil and natural gas production operations. These changes retain the framework of air emissions regulations of oil and natural gas production, but they modify flawed provisions, in the 2016 New Source Performance Standards fugitive emissions program that was driven by political pressures to rush those regulations to completion.
The Obama Administration had promulgated regulation of methane from the transmission and storage segment of the oil and gas sector without taking the appropriate steps to justify those actions. EPA is issuing policy amendments in response to President Trump’s Executive Order on Promoting Energy Independence and Economic Growth. The order directs agencies to review existing regulations that potentially “burden the development or use of domestically produced energy resources,” including oil and natural gas, and to rescind or suspend regulatory requirements if appropriate.
The Trump Administration’s amendments not only follow the text of the Clean Air Act, but also reduce regulatory burden to the industry and streamline other requirements. Protection of human health and the environment will continue through controls for smog-forming volatile organic compounds for the production and processing segments of the industry, reducing methane at the same time.
DEPA believes abundant, reliable, affordable, domestic energy is key to revitalizing the US economy and reshoring US businesses after the Covid crises. Regulatory relief like this will ensure that US independent producers are able to meet those energy requirements.
DEPA PRESS RELEASE – JULY 6, 2020
The Domestic Energy Producers Alliance (DEPA) congratulates the US Department of Energy (DOE) for the issuance of a final long-term order authorizing the export of domestically produced liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the proposed Jordan Cove LNG Terminal (Jordan Cove) in Coos Bay, Oregon.
The US has become the number one producer of crude oil and natural gas on the planet. Providing our friends and allies with American crude oil and natural gas as liquified natural gas (LNG) is a boost the US economy and provides stability to the world markets and ensures reliability of supply.
US domestic natural gas is far more abundant and affordable today than anyone imagined ten years ago. US domestic producers are anxious to provide not just America’s needs with cheap abundant natural gas but also be part of an ever-growing international market. With the addition of the Jordan Cove LNG facility, US producers will have another avenue to provide LNG to markets that otherwise may never benefit from the American energy renaissance.
Additionally, if the Jordan Cove LNG Terminal, including the Pacific Connector Pipeline, create the expected 6,000 + jobs during construction and generate up to $100 million in state and local tax revenue annually DEPA believes this looks like a win/win for everyone.
DEPA PRESS RELEASE – JUNE 25, 2020
S&P Global Platts announced today the creation of Platts American GulfCoast Select (AGS), a new benchmark which will serve as a more accurate and reliable source for pricing crude oil in America. The Domestic Energy Producers Alliance (DEPA) is a proud member of the AGS Best Practices Task Force Association, in which DEPA chairman Harold Hamm is also serving as chairman.
“This is a pivotal step for the oil and gas industry as a new, waterborne benchmark is necessary to competitively market America’s growing crude oil supply,” said chairman Harold Hamm. “We appreciate the work Platts and others have put forth to move American oil and gas to a more competitive market. Since the oil export ban was lifted in 2015, American producers began migrating to global markets rather than being landlocked in the U.S.
America remains the number one producer of oil and natural gas on the planet, and this new benchmark better aligns with where American energy is headed in the future. I commend Platts as well as the other members of this task force for recognizing the need and moving expeditiously to better unleash American energy to the world.”
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