Propane Caucus Among 3 NPGA Growth Initiatives

Now that the propane industry has survived the past winter season in good shape, and the Propane Education and Research Enhancement Act is now law, the National Propane Gas Association (NPGA) is refocusing its attention on accelerating growth in gallons sold. A Congressional Propane Caucus is one of several methods it will use to achieve that goal.

Many people became acquainted with propane for the first time during the supply and infrastructure situation of the winter of 2013-2014, and NPGA is planning to take advantage of increased propane awareness by establishing a Congressional Propane Caucus, said Phil Squair, NPGA senior vice president of governmental affairs. The Congressional Propane Caucus will be a tool to help members of Congress who care about propane keep up with industry issues. Work to implement the caucus, which will have a Republican chair and Democratic co-chair, is in its beginning stages. NPGA is in preliminary discussions with members of Congress who might serve in those leadership roles.

Squair pointed out that the Congressional Propane Caucus would be a group that the propane industry could turn to for help on various issues such as contacting the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) for information on the status of its work that would restore the public education programs of the Propane Education & Research Council (PERC).

“We would immediately have a ready-to-go group of individuals that knew about propane issues and cared about propane issues, and we would be able to go to them and say, ‘Here’s the latest, here’s the status of what’s going on in the field, or conversely, here is something we’d like you to help us with,’” Squair noted. “We would have a ready-made list of offices that were interested and knowledgeable about propane. That is going to go a long way toward knowing who understands propane and who we can go to for these types of things. If there are things we don’t want to have happen and that would affect us disproportionately from, say, other energies, we could go to the propane caucus and say, ‘This is a bad idea, we wanted to give you a heads up, maybe this is something we can work on to change it.’”

Appropriations is a second area of focus that NPGA will use in its efforts to increase propane industry gallon sales. Enhanced government agency outreach was part of the association’s Vision 2014 initiative to grow the industry. The supply and infrastructure issues of winter 2013-2014 slowed some of the momentum of Vision 2014, but NPGA will make a renewed effort to work with agencies that fund research to help the private sector with research and development of new technologies.

On March 2 and 3, NPGA, along with representatives from AmeriGas, Ferrellgas, and Blossman Gas, met with staff members for several U.S. House members who serve on the Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations. During these meetings, NPGA made requests related to propane autogas and residential combined heat and power. The propane group also let the Hill know that when DOE program managers write solicitations for proposals from the private sector, propane is often not welcome in those discussions. The managers enter those discussions predisposed to accept only natural gas and biofuels. The propane group argued that propane should be part of the discussion in bidding for grant dollars.

“We’re asking for parity when the energy and water appropriations bill moves up on the Hill,” Squair explained, adding that he is optimistic that the managers were receptive to the argument.

Tax credits are an additional area of focus on growth. NPGA is pushing the U.S. Senate Finance Committee and House Ways and Means Committee to extend the expired 50-cent-per-gallon alternative-fuel tax credit and alternative fuel refueling infrastructure tax credit and to reform how propane’s excise tax is calculated so it is based on energy content.

Squair acknowledges that Congressional discussions on tax credits are in the background at the moment because of discussions taking place on reform of overall corporate and individual taxes. The propane industry has communicated with Congress in favor of tax reform, but Congress members are currently hesitant to take a position in favor of or against tax credits and extenders. “So the tax extenders debate is sort of a quiet debate right now because we’re letting the broader decisions related to reform go first,” Squair said.

Talking to BPN in early March, he mentioned the public education restriction on PERC, noting that a final resolution might be coming any moment. He has heard that DOC was at the tail end of its new calculation on whether the price for consumer grade propane compared to an index of prices of competing fuels exceeds a certain threshold, which in 2009 triggered a restriction on PERC’s consumer education programs.

“It could be a matter of days, we hope, before we have a final announcement that the issue is resolved,” Squair added. —