New Mexico is a top producer of natural gas and some environmentalists see the fuel as a more environmentally friendly energy choice than coal.

But is it?

Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club, sees well-regulated natural gas production as a good way to transition from coal and oil to renewable sources like solar, wind and biofuels. "Natural gas is an excellent example of a fuel that can be produced in quite a clean way, and shouldn't be wasted," he said. "We see it as part of the energy transition to a post-fossil fuel economy."

But Johnny Micou, who helped martial a grass-roots effort to stop exploratory oil and gas drilling in the Galisteo Basin near Santa Fe, said the environmental impact of unconventional drilling practices that are allowing industry to tap into new natural gas sources have not been thoroughly studied. "The cumulative environmental impacts of drilling need to be considered," he said.

Micou thinks the Sierra Club needs to take a tougher stand. Supporting natural gas as a "transition" fuel only delays the sense of urgency needed to make a real and substantial shift in energy sources. "There are parts where we (he and Pope) agree, but I would like to see more strides now and a significant change from the way we do energy sources and automobiles," Micou said. "Soft-pedaling on industry now is going to perpetuate the problem."

New Mexico is the fourth- or fifth-largest producer of natural gas in the country every year and revenues generated from the billions of cubic feet extracted are a big boost for the state. Most of the natural gas comes from the San Juan Basin in northwestern New Mexico and the Permian Basin in the south. Now energy companies are eyeing basins from Tucumcari to Mora that are potentially rich in natural gas.

Pope said he opposes coal-bed methane drilling and said there are enough other natural gas resources available that "we can be very picky about where we drill." Like Micou, he's concerned with the potential environmental hazards linked to hydraulic fracturing and produced water from natural gas drilling.

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is the process where fluids are forced into coal-bed seams or shale to release gas. Industry watchdogs have claimed the chemicals used in the fluids are contaminating groundwater.

Produced water is the water that naturally occurs where gas is found and is pumped out, or flows out, during the drilling process. That produced water can contain naturally occurring minerals and leached fracking fluids, both potentially bad if they contaminate groundwater. Those fluids used to be put in unlined pits or dumped on the ground in New Mexico, according to Mark Fesmire, director of New Mexico's Oil Conservation Division. Now they must be stored in lined pits, part of a new pit rule, and then re-injected deep underground.

The industry has repeatedly defended its drilling practices and says more regulation only increases the cost of domestic energy production. Bob Gallagher of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association has repeatedly said there's not been one case of contamination of drinking water supplies from oil and gas production and none proven from fracking. "There have been over 1 million frack jobs in the United States in the past 40 years without one documented case of groundwater contamination," he said via e-mail.

Sig Silber, the water issues chairman for the Rio Grande Chapter of the Sierra Club, said he distinguishes between areas already developed for oil and gas, and those that aren't. "Where oil and gas production is already a part of the economy there should be a focus on best practices," he said. "Where oil and gas is not currently a large part of the economy, then there's a whole new set of issues to consider."

The Sierra Club released its revamped policy on natural gas production this week. "There's an opportunity to replace coal with gas and an opportunity to produce gas with much lower environmental impact," Pope said. "But we need to take both opportunities."

Tapping into domestic natural gas resources is an important way of paying our own energy consumption bill, Pope said. "There is no such thing as (completely) clean energy. All energy has a price," he said. "As long as you want to live a highly motorized lifestyle, even if you are using biofuels, there's going to be a cost. We shouldn't expect to ship those costs elsewhere."

Micou said he's hearing talk of biofuels and renewable energy, but "I just don't see that we're pushing that hard in that direction (other than natural gas). If we back off and say natural gas is a good transition fuel, then we'll be doing this for the next 30 years. It doesn't push us hard enough to change."

Contact Staci Matlock at 986-3055 or smatlock@sfnewmexican.com.