I was the assistant secretary for domestic policy and international affairs at the U.S. Department of Energy in 2005 when hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck. Drilling operations in Louisiana and offshore in the Gulf of Mexico were shut down, taking significant supplies of oil off the market and causing major spikes in gasoline prices just as Americans were heading out on summer vacation. While we didn’t have any more oil to produce to replace the lost supply, I did have an important arrow in my quiver to alleviate the strain on gasoline prices: An agreement with 27 other countries around the world to release 60 million barrels of oil into the global energy market. By the time everybody was driving to see their relatives for the winter holidays, gasoline prices had more or less normalized. Unfortunately, I had no good options for replacing shut-in natural gas.
Times have changed. In September, the Potential Gas Committee and the American Gas Association announced that the United States has a natural gas resource base of 3,374 trillion cubic feet, the highest resource evaluation in the committee’s 54-year history—and the largest two-year increase ever at 20 percent. In this issue of American Gas, we also have an article that tells the story of Nicor Gas in Illinois delivering 4.8 billion cubic feet of natural gas during the 2019 polar vortex in the upper Midwest, surpassing the previous record for the company’s single largest delivery day.
That article highlights proactive planning, specifically how utilities store gas in the summer for reliable performance in the winter. A polar vortex does not happen every year, but natural gas utilities are prepared if it does. Ryan Dusek, Nicor Gas’ director of system operations, says summer is where winter’s successes are born. I think that sentiment perfectly sums up the mentality of America’s natural gas utilities. Natural gas utilities are unshakable in the face of torrential rains, brutal cold or other natural disasters. The planning and preparation that we have done over the past few decades is paying dividends in unsurpassed operation capacity, increasing efficiency and affordable bills.
Today, we have abundant natural gas and a resilient delivery system. On an operational level, our reliability is unmatched. No other energy system can deliver the volume of energy that we do and especially under adverse circumstances. While many sectors are developing storage technology, those solutions are far out on the horizon. Communities throughout the United States reap the benefits of the approximately 400 active underground storage fields every winter, and with greater volumes of natural gas being used for power generation, communities experience these benefits in the summer months as well. In addition, superior planning means that gas purchased at lower prices in the summer and delivered in the winter facilitates greater affordability.
There are countless other examples where natural gas customers are benefiting from our sector’s hard work and careful forethought. A concerted, multi-decade effort by natural gas utilities to upgrade our nation’s pipeline network in order to enhance safety has contributed significantly to a declining trend in emissions from the natural gas distribution system. Natural gas utilities in the United States spend $4 million on energy efficiency programs every day—a number that has only increased as utilities help customers offset more than 12 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year.
AGA members are also making investments today that will benefit customers for many years in the future. We are enhancing high-efficiency natural gas appliances and working with policymakers to improve energy efficiency programs to ensure all customers have access to these appliances. We are funding research and development in next-generation natural gas technologies for customers and utility operations. This is the pathway to achieve our shared goal of reducing emissions while maintaining affordable, reliable energy and the quality of life that Americans enjoy.
When most people gather the family around the Thanksgiving table, they will not think about their natural gas utilities and the role we play in warming their homes and cooking the food they are about to enjoy. But we are thinking about them and working to improve their lives 24/7/365.
President and CEO