!!!!!!Memo: ALEC’s Frack Attack Now Includes LNG Exports, CNG Vehicles !

Steve Horn; Research Fellow, DeSmogBlog — July, 30 2014!!The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) serves as a key vehicle through which cor-porate producers and consumers of unconventional gas obtained from hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) curry favor and push for policies favorable to their bottom lines in statehouses na-tionwide. !!Most significantly for its most recent efforts in this space, liquefied natural gas (LNG) exporter Cheniere became an ALEC dues-paying member in May 2013, joining corporate colleagues like ExxonMobil, Koch Industries and Dominion, as well as industry lobbying powerhouse, America’s Natural Gas Alliance (ANGA). ANGA was crowned an ALEC member in August 2013.!!From Cradle to Grave, Frackers Use ALEC to Get Their Way!!From cradle to grave of the shale gas and oil production lifecycle, ALEC’s oil and gas industry corporate patrons have used ALEC’s lobbying apparatus and influence peddling machine in everything but name (they prefer to call it “education”) to pass model bills and resolutions through the “corporate bill mill.” !!In many cases, these model bills and resolutions become state law. In the case of fracking, of-ten model bills and resolutions are passed in statehouses first and then brought back to ALEC by corporate lobbyists to become copy-paste templates for other state legislators to bring back to their legislatures.!!Some model bills and resolutions passed in this space by ALEC and eventually becoming state law in many states include: !!1.) “Resolution Opposing EPA’s Regulatory Train Wreck” !!! -Calls for “moratorium on…any new air quality regulation by EPA by any means !! necessary…for a period of at least two years, including defunding EPA air ! !! quality regulatory activities”!!! -Introduced in 34 states, passing in 13, as of a June 2011 press release since removed !! from ALEC’s website but up on the Way Back Machine!!2.) “An Act Granting the Authority of Rural Counties to Transition to Decentralized Land Use Regulation”!!! -Excerpt: “[T]he planning and zoning authority granted to rural counties may encourage !! land use regulation which is overly centralized, intrusive and politicized…The local law !! shall require the county to repeal or modify any land use restriction stemming from the !

! county’s exercise of its planning or zoning authority, which prohibits or conditionally !! restricts the peaceful or highest and best uses of private property.”!!! -Bills like it have passed in Ohio, Idaho, Colorado, and Texas!!3.) “Disclosure of Hydraulic Fracturing Fluid Composition Act,” endorsed by ExxonMobil at ALEC’s Dec. 2011 meeting according to a New York Times investigation!!! -Modeled after HB 3328 in TX, passed in June 2011!!! -Bill has passed in TX, CO and proposed in IL, FL, LA; FracFocus implemented in other !! states, also official database of U.S. Department of Interior’s Bureau of Land ! !! Management (BLM)!!This Time Around: LNG Exports and CNG Vehicles!!LNG!!Having won some key policy fights in other fracking-centric areas, ALEC has now become a key hub for its corporate benefactors to push through LNG exports and CNG vehicles. !!For example, ALEC’s 2014 Annual Meeting in Dallas will feature a presentation by Jason French, Cheniere’s Director of Government and Public Affairs, on LNG exports and a vote on a model resolution titled, “Resolution In Support of Expanded Liquefied Natural Gas Exports.” !!According to French’s comments provided to me via email, ALEC “provided information that helped shape the resolution” and Cheniere has “encouraged consideration of a resolution in support of LNG exports since joining ALEC” as a dues-paying member in May 2013. !!Research ties the bill’s origins back to House Concurrent Resolution 29 passed Louisiana in March 2014, which came in the aftermath of “LNG Day.” One of the two resolution co-sponsors, Sen. John A. Alario, Jr., is an ALEC member and has taken significant campaign contributions from LNG exporters, such as ExxonMobil, Energy Transfer Partners and Sempra. !!Records obtained under Louisiana’s Public Records Act by DeSmogBlog show LNG Day was organized and arranged by The Picard Group, a Louisiana-based lobbying firm. !!Cheniere sits on The Picard Group’s client list and representatives from the company were copied on email outreach to Louisiana state representatives inviting them to participate in LNG Day, according to the records received via Louisiana Public Records Act. LNG Day sponsors, records also show, included Cheniere, ANGA, Sempra LNG, Trunkline LNG, Magnolia LNG, the Louisiana Oil and Gas Association, Our Energy Moment and Chesapeake Energy.!!Though final LNG exports decisions are made at the federal-level — which Cheniere and other companies also have their bases covered on in terms of currying favor — the states still play a key role in determining whether or not LNG exports ever become a reality. !!Finally, it is crucial to point out that in January 2014, the Louisiana-based State Policy Network offshoot — the Pelican Institute — commissioned a report promoting LNG exports titled, “Risk,

Reward & Revolution: Why globalizing the natural gas revolution is smart environmental and economic policy for Louisiana.” The SPN network, DeSmogBlog revealed in December 2013, is a creation of ALEC.!!Unsurprisingly then, French wrote an article singing a similar tune in the July/August edition of ALEC’s magazine, “Inside ALEC.”!!CNG Vehicles!!ALEC appears to have become a key hub for the upstart compressed natural gas (CNG) vehi-cles industry, as well. Using fracked gas as a feedstock, T. Boone Pickens — owner of Clean Energy Fuels Corporation and BP Capital — is perhaps the most famous promoter of a CNG-powered fleet. !!As the long-time promoter of the Pickens Plan and the force behind the 2011-proposed NAT GAS Act that died a slow death in Congress, Pickens’ dream of a truly massive fleet of CNG ve-hicles on the road has yet to come into fruition. !!But the industry’s not done trying, yet, as is evident by looking at ALEC’s records. !!ALEC’s 35-day mailer distributed on June 25, 2014 shows that a model bill on “Weights and Measures and Standards for Dispensing CNG and LNG Motor Fuels” will be voted on at the meeting. !!Bills with similar language have already passed in California, Pennsylvania, and Oklahoma, which the ALEC model is likely based upon. Several of the co-sponsors of the ALEC model res-olution in Pennsylvania are ALEC members and nearly all of the representatives in all of these states sit in districts with CNG fueling station infrastructure. !!Perhaps unsurprisingly, the original California resolution — Senate Joint Resolution 29 — was supported by the California Natural Gas Vehicles Coalition. !!Clean Energy Fuels Corporation is a member of California Natural Gas Vehicles Coalition and the original bill sponsor, Sen. Ted Lieu, oversees the Senate district housing a major Clean En-ergy Fuels Corporation CNG fueling station. Lieu is a Democrat who has taken a significant amount of campaign money from the Clean Energy Fuels and is now running for US Congress. !!The CNG industry attempted to push a similar resolution through the National Conference of Weights and Measures at the annual meeting held in Detroit, Michigan in mid-July, but it did not pass. Clean Energy Fuels Corporation has a spot on the Natural Gas Steering Committee of the NCWM. !!“Winning is the Operative Word”!!Though unclear if Pickens and Clean Energy Fuels have put the model bill on the table for the ALEC meeting that’s now up for a vote, one thing’s crystal clear: ALEC is a place where corpo-rations like Clean Energy Fuels, Cheniere, ExxonMobil and others come in order to advance their bottom line. !!

As former ALEC Executive Director Sam Brunelli once wrote July 1991 letter to an executive at the Tobacco Institute, “…winning is what ALEC is all about…“Winning is the operative word…[W]inning the public policy debate will continue to have a tremendous positive effect on the 'bottom line' of your company,””!!