In early October, stakeholders were preparing for the U.N. climate treaty negotiations in Copenhagen. President Obama had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, in part for his stance on climate change. The potential role of abundant natural gas in reducing greenhouse-gas emissions was headlining mainstream media.

The fifth annual ASPO-USA (Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas) International Peak Oil Conference was under way in Denver, and Deutsche Bank oil analyst Paul Sankey’s report, “The Peak Oil Market,” was the talk of the blogs.

The time seemed ripe for an energy initiative involving natural gas, and perhaps surprisingly to some, it was an environmental nonprofit that stepped up.

Worldwatch Institute, a Washington-based research organization focused on an environmentally sustainable world, proposed a one-year initiative to shape a 21st century global energy strategy around natural gas, renewable energy and efficiency. Driving the project is the vast—but as yet unquantified—unconventional gas potential worldwide, which could solidify gas’ role as the transition fuel to a low-carbon world.

Christopher Flavin, president of Worldwatch, was “turned on” to the potential abundance of natural gas by GHK Exploration founder and chief executive officer Robert A. Hefner III in the early 1990s. Today, he thinks people are finally waking up.

“There’s a growing realization in leadership circles that gas from shale may be as abundant as coal. In a carbon-constrained world, logic would argue that it should grab large chunks of market share in coming years.” The fuel should be a “cornerstone” of strategies to advance energy security and reduce the threat of climate change, he says.

While not yet formally announced at press time, the initiative’s first goal is to insert natural gas into national and international policy discussions in Copenhagen and beyond, with a conference on worldwide unconventional gas potential during the historic climate negotiations.

Meanwhile, Worldwatch is assembling what Heidi VanGenderen, team leader for the initiative, calls an “unorthodox” coalition of environmental groups, research-based organizations such as RPSEA (Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America), NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) and natural gas industry partners. It anticipates funding a research fellow to determine how energy systems can be redesigned based on an abundance of gas and the need to dramatically lower carbon emissions. The focus is on building a solid information platform about the gas as a transition fuel.

“This is a pathway out of poverty for many communities worldwide. And if you look at gas deployed in the broader context of marriage with an array of renewables, you can clobber your carbon count,” VanGenderen says.

Fred Julander, president of Julander Energy Co. of Denver and founding chairman of the Colorado Oil & Gas Association’s Rocky Mountain Natural Gas Strategy Conference, is playing a key role in recruiting and leading the unlikely coalition as Flavin’s co-chair for the project.

“The future is low-carbon energy, and renewables are a large portion of that, along with natural gas,” says Julander. “We need to work together, because the forces of the status quo are so strong that neither of us can change the current picture alone.

“The low-carbon market, both in North America and worldwide, is the only market big enough to absorb all the unconventional gas we’re finding.”

This summer, COGA attendees were told by Tim Wirth (former U.S. senator, and now president of the United Nations Foundation) that coal producers and coal-burning utilities helped shape the Waxman-Markey energy and climate bill.

“If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu,” says Flavin. “We’ve had the dirtiest fuel shaping legislation, and the cleanest fuel sort of out to lunch.”

“The climate imperative is driving this initiative,” adds VanGenderen. “Not everyone agrees on climate change. But why take a chance, when we have the opportunity to shift to a cleaner fuel?

“We should find the highest, best use of our remaining fossil fuels. If we use it wisely, natural gas is viable for 100 years.”

The notion that natural gas could be a major element of decarbonizing the economy is not something that most academics or environmental or industry groups have even begun to think about, says Flavin. “It has the potential to be a game-changer in the coming energy transition.”