Member Login

WESTERN ENERGY ALLIANCE

  • THE ALLIANCE
    • ABOUT
    • CONNECT
    • NEWSROOM
    • SOURCE ROCK BLOG
  • GET INVOLVED
    • NETWORKING EVENTS
    • MEMBER BENEFITS
    • MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION
    • POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEE
  • ADVOCACY
    • REGULATORY
    • PUBLIC LANDS
    • WILDLIFE
    • LEGAL
  • MEMBERS
    • Member Login
  • THE ALLIANCE
    • ABOUT
    • CONNECT
    • NEWSROOM
    • SOURCE ROCK BLOG
  • GET INVOLVED
    • NETWORKING EVENTS
    • MEMBER BENEFITS
    • MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION
    • POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEE
  • ADVOCACY
    • REGULATORY
    • PUBLIC LANDS
    • WILDLIFE
    • LEGAL
  • MEMBERS
    • Member Login

SOURCE ROCK BLOG

When Literally Means Figuratively

2/12/2021

0 Comments

 
Picture
Why is it that “balance” is one of those words that people use when they’re doing something undecidedly unbalanced? Such is the case with the president’s executive order banning oil and natural gas leasing on federal lands.
 
The fact sheet put out by the new administration led with it. President Biden is “upholding the commitment” to “restore balance”. But there’s been a balance on federal lands at least since the 1970s when Congress passed the Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA). The balance involves the multiple use of federal lands, which includes conservation as well as oil and natural gas and other productive uses. By banning leasing, President Biden has decidedly tipped the balance.


Read More
0 Comments

Impacts Already Being Felt on Existing Leases

2/2/2021

0 Comments

 
​In the West, oil and natural gas resources are inextricably bound to federal public lands, and therefore, to the men and women of the industry who work there. Likewise, we are inextricably bound to the Department of the Interior, which oversees those public lands.
 
As such, we wish to work constructively with the department, and seek to find common ground whenever possible. But when the first action of the political staff of a new administration is to ban the very activity that we do, even temporarily, we cannot just sit idly by.

We know that the 60-day temporary ban announced by Acting Interior Secretary Scott de la Vega was just an initial step to a more permanent ban. And indeed, just one week later the president himself signed a ban on all new leasing into the indefinite future. Because we know that a “
pause” on new leases to “launch a rigorous review of all leasing and permitting” (emphasis added) means a years-long ban on leasing that will last at least Biden’s entire term.

Read More
0 Comments

Western Energy  Alliance Interview with BBC World News

1/27/2021

0 Comments

 
​U.S. President Joe Biden is due to sign new executive orders today including cutting subsidies to fossil fuel companies. His critics warn it will cost jobs. With is Kathleen Sgamma, president of Western Energy Alliance, a body that represents oil and gas companies in the western states. 
0 Comments

Hope for a Resurgence of Sanity

1/7/2021

1 Comment

 
Picture
I don’t usually make general statements reacting to major events shaping the country and world, because there is plenty of coverage on them. We take positions on issues in our portfolio, as directed by our members, committees and boards, and I usually do not like to stray into larger issues that are outside those lanes. We stick to our issues on social media, and I personally limit engagement on most other issues because of my professional position and general intolerance for a medium that quickly devolves into people yelling past each other.
 
However, the events yesterday at the Capitol were so shocking that our policy engagement with and PAC support for the Trump Administration compels me to speak up. I am disgusted by the violence witnessed yesterday and President Trump’s role in spreading misinformation that incited it. I’m disgusted he discredited all the good work he did reorienting the judiciary back toward respect for the rule of law and constitution by dishonoring the vote of the People and the rulings of those very same judges on his numerous challenges. I’m disheartened he besmirched his smart, well-intentioned people in the agencies who did such good work on important policies that advance the crucial mission of making life-sustaining, affordable energy accessible to all Americans, no matter their race, gender, and political orientation. 


Read More
1 Comment

Fracking Strongly Supported in 2020 Election

11/10/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
The 2020 election proved nationally what we’ve known in the West about hydraulic fracturing: whenever it’s on the ballot there’s strong support in oil and natural gas country.
 
Over several election cycles we’ve seen fracking on local ballots either directly through initiatives (such as the failed Proposition 112 in Colorado) or indirectly through pro-oil and natural gas candidates. Each time fracking received strong support. The 2020 election was the first test nationally of that trend.
​
​Vice President Joe Biden said he’d love to ban fracking nationwide in the primary but admitted it’s not possible. Instead he proposed a ban only on federal public lands. It was a calculated move because only about 10 percent of our nation’s oil and natural gas come from public lands. Plus, 95 percent of wells in the country are fracked so a nationwide ban would have been politically costly in must-win Pennsylvania.


Read More
0 Comments

Washington Doesn’t Get It. Workers Prefer O&G Jobs.

8/5/2020

0 Comments

 
​Against the backdrop of worsening employment from COVID-19, a storyline has emerged among Green New Deal proponents that the biggest beneficiaries of their climate proposals will be workers. Two plans released in July tout the promise of great jobs and a smooth transition away from fossil fuels to renewables over the next couple of decades. The trouble is outside of Washington, DC labor isn’t buying it.
​
​Vice President Joe Biden’s latest plan talks a lot about creating jobs and supporting union workers if elected president. His plan states, “We must ensure jobs created as part of the clean energy revolution offer good wages, benefits, and worker protections. Toward this end, President Biden will defend workers’ rights to form unions and collectively bargain in these emerging and growing industries.”
Picture
Photo credit: Laborers-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust

Read More
0 Comments

Conservation Courtesy of the Oilfield

8/5/2020

0 Comments

 
​The Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA) is the largest public lands conservation bill signed into law in 50 years, and it’s almost exclusively funded by revenue from federal oil and natural gas. The new law is an excellent reminder that the nation’s primary source of funding for conservation is oil and natural gas. When obstructionist groups and politicians try to stop leasing and development on federal lands, they are now directly taking funding away from national parks, wildlife refuges, and conservation projects.
 
The GAOA combined two public lands conservation bills that Congress had been unable to pass individually: the Restore Our Parks Act to reduce the National Park Service’s $12 billion maintenance backlog across all national parks and monuments, and the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) Permanent Funding Act to fully and permanently fund public lands conservation nationwide. 
Picture

Read More
0 Comments

House Climate Action Plan Strikes at Oil and Natural Gas

7/13/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
A year and a half after the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis was formed in the U.S. House, the Democratic majority’s climate policy roadmap has been released. Solving the Climate Crisis is a wide-ranging and detailed report that targets oil and natural gas as well as almost every other industry.
 
The committee’s formation attracted considerable media attention as a major step taken by the incoming majority following the 2018 midterm landslide. Interest was also fueled around the exclusion of freshman Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez from the committee following her election as a prominent climate champion and co-author of the Green New Deal (GND).


Read More
0 Comments

Oilfield Conservation Bill Advances

6/23/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
Last week, the Senate passed the Great American Outdoors Act. Western Energy Alliance has been actively supporting the provisions of the bill that would take revenue from oil and natural gas production on public lands, and direct it into national parks.
​​

We conducted a #ParksinWreck campaign to highlight the $12 billion funding shortfall in our beloved national parks, and how the parks suffer from crumbling roads, dilapidated visitors’ centers, and eroding trails. We raised money for Friends of Arches and Canyonlands Park as a way to raise awareness of the need to reduce the maintenance backlog in the parks.​


Read More
0 Comments

Environmental Groups Really Didn’t Mean It

5/19/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
We knew something was going on when we started getting press inquiries two months before the lease list for the September Utah lease sale was even released. It was a sure sign that a narrative was being developed by environmental Keep-It-in-the-Ground groups that was being lapped up by the media.
 
The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) generated a map with nominated parcels and started making the rounds with the Washington Post and Bloomberg. As usual, environmental groups are insinuating that there should not be leasing “near” national parks. It’s a consistent effort to assert a buffer around national parks, but of course, “near” can mean anything. We’ve seen groups complain about leases 50 miles from park boundaries because that’s too near. But even a quick look at this map shows that most leases are several miles away from park boundaries.


Read More
0 Comments
<<Previous

    Archives

    February 2021
    January 2021
    November 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

​Sitemap   |  Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | ©2020 Western Energy Alliance
1775 Sherman Street, Suite 2700
​
Denver, CO 80203
​(303) 623-0987
Picture