Southern Gas Association (SGA) is a national trade association that represents companies within the natural gas industry with a focus on operations in the southern United States. The association describes itself as the only natural gas industry association that represents all segments of the industry. ¹

Background

Southern Gas Association was founded in 1908 in Atlanta and moved its headquarters to Dallas in the 1940s. The organization grew following a post-World War II boom of natural gas pipeline construction in the southern United States. In the 1960s, SGA began conducting marketing activities on behalf of the natural gas industry and by the 1990s the organization released a graphic icon for products touting the “natural gas advantage.” ²

SGA claims to have 80 core member companies that are direct operators within the natural gas industry segments of exploration, production, gas supply marketing, and midstream and pipeline transmission. The organization also has 380 associate members that are otherwise connected to the natural gas industry. The organization hosts annual events and conferences that include a reported 6,000 annual participants. ³

Membership

Southern Gas Association’s board of directors includes representatives from companies such as Xcel Energy, Williams Companies, BHE GT&S, Duke Energy, Dominion Energy, Washington Gas, and CenterPoint Energy. ⁴

Affiliated Organizations

In 1952, Southern Gas Association founded the Gas Machinery Research Council (GMRC) as a subsidiary organization in response to a growth of pipeline infrastructure in the 1940s. The GMRC’s goal was to fund research to improve quality and efficacy of pipeline facilities and gas compressor stations, which were inadequate to fulfill the current needs of the time. GMRC continues to operate as a subsidiary to fund machinery research efforts. ⁵

SGA is also an organizer of the Texas Pipeline Awareness Alliance, a coalition of natural gas companies that fund public education campaigns to promote public awareness of pipelines and other natural gas infrastructure and to promote damage prevention through running campaigns urging the public to call 811 to have their yards marked for underground utilities before digging. ^{6 7}

Spending

In February 2023, author Robert Bryce published “The Anti-Industry Industry: What the media won’t tell you about the $4.5 billion-per-year NGO-corporate-industrial-climate complex.” In the article, he detailed that the overwhelming majority of the money involved in the energy and climate debate in the U.S. today is not on the side of traditional energy producers, mentioning the Southern Gas Association as one such lobbying group for traditional energy. Bryce showed through public records that the top 25 anti-hydrocarbon/anti-nuclear NGOs had total revenue of about $4.5 billion, whereas the top 25 non-profit associations that represent hydrocarbon producers (including the SGA) and the nuclear energy industry, as well as their allies in the think tank sector, raised only $990 million. ⁸

1. “Membership.” SGA. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://southerngas.org/membership/
2. “The Southern Gas Association.” SGA. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://www.southerngas.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/SGA-Infographic-FINAL-17×36-1-scaled.jpg
3. “Membership.” SGA. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://southerngas.org/membership/
4. “Board of Directors.” SGA. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://southerngas.org/about/board-of-directors/
5. “Moving the Industry Forward.” GMRC. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://www.gmrc.org/about
6. “Membership.” SGA. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://southerngas.org/membership/
7. “Home.” Texas Pipeline Awareness Alliance. Accessed April 4, 2023. https://pipeline-safety.org/.
8. Robert Bryce. “The Anti-Industry Industry.” Substack. February 18, 2023. Accessed March 19, 2023. https://robertbryce.substack.com/p/the-anti-industry-industry.