Among the political races settled Nov. 8-from small-town school board seats to the presidency itself-was one of the three seats on the Texas Railroad Commission (TRC), the agency in charge of overseeing what are now among some of the world's largest oil and gas reserves. Republican Wayne Christian won.
Christian's victory was not a surprise. A Democrat has not served on the commission since 1994 and Republican President-elect Donald J. Trump won a vast majority of Texas' counties. The state's four biggest major cities went the other way at the top of the ticket, as did the southern Rio Grande Valley. The western valley was mixed and everywhere else was a sea of electoral red.
The candidates
Christian served for 14 years (1997-2011) as state representative for Texas House District 9 (HD9), which extends along the state's eastern border with Arkansas and Louisiana. Much of the Haynesville-Bossier shale lies within HD9. Natural gas production from the play began to ramp up to 177 MMcfd in 2009 and peaked in 2012 at just under 1.3 bcfd. Christian was a member of the house's business and industry committee.
The 66-year old native Texan earned a BBA from Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Tex. Before opening his own financial services business in 1987 he was lead singer and manager of the Mercy River Boys country-gospel band, two-time Gospel Music Association finalists as group of the year and 1979 Grammy nominees.
In addition to the state's general rightward lean and Christian's Texan bona fides, major-party opposition was token. Grady Yarbrough, the Democrat nominee, is a 79-year old retired educator from Flint, Tex. His campaign was proudly self-funded and spent no money, as was the case for his 2012 candidacy for US Senate.
More interesting-though ultimately no more viable-was the candidacy of Libertarian Party nominee Mark Miller, a retired petroleum engineer, software entrepreneur, and former member of the University of Texas at Austin's petroleum engineering faculty with a PhD from Stanford University who had run in 2014 as well.
Miller was endorsed by all of the state's major newspapers, including the Houston Chronicle and Dallas Morning News. His platform was steeped in the notions that government should not promote industry and that the commission was in need of a significant technology upgrade. He was also keen to ensure that industry best-practices be followed even while remaining unconvinced of human activity's role in climate change.
Structure, work
The TRC's three members serve rotating 6-year terms. Christian, who filled a vacant seat, joins engineer Ryan Sitton (elected for the first time in 2014), and commission chair Christi Craddick who filled a vacant seat in 2012. The commissioners select the chair themselves.
Commissioners must navigate often competing interests and contrasting situations, particularly in the current low-price environment. While output from the Permian basin rises, the Eagle Ford shale languishes. And as operators in the areas hardest hit by the price downturn struggle to survive, watch must still be kept to make sure their activities are unwound or transferred in a safe and responsible manner. Concerns also remain regarding the connection between seismic activity and disposal wells.
Legislators have called for the TRC to be renamed to more accurately describe its role in Texas' governance. These calls have so far been thwarted, but are set to be renewed when the Texas legislature reconvenes Jan. 10. More important than what the agency is called, however, is that it functions properly.
The last legislative session closed in June 2014 when West Texas Intermediate crude was still priced about $106/bbl. Texas revenues declined last year, driven in large part by the lower oil prices, and efforts to either jump start the industry or cut costs will be occurring against a backdrop of increased financial, safety, property rights, and environmental scrutiny.