There’s an interesting story in yesterday’s New York Times about the growing potential for natural gas as a source of power generation, in light of the recent nuclear power incident in Japan.

In the coming weeks and months, the discussion will continue – here in the U.S. and in countries around the world – about the decisions and investments that have to be made to meet future needs for reliable, affordable, and safe energy.

As the article indicates, natural gas will no doubt move to the forefront of that discussion – but if you’ve seen any energy forecasts over the past couple of years, you might say that natural gas was already there.

Over the past two years, major energy agencies – from the International Energy Agency to the U.S. Energy Information Administration – have increased their forecasts of large growth in worldwide natural gas demand. This growth reflects technology advances in unlocking abundant new sources of supply such as shale gas, as well as the economic expansion of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

In ExxonMobil’s Outlook for Energy released earlier this year, we project that global gas demand will be more than 45 percent higher in 2030 than it is today, largely driven by huge growth in energy demand in developing countries, coupled with growing worldwide needs for clean power generation. In this respect, natural gas emits up to 60 percent less carbon dioxide than coal, in addition to significantly fewer emissions that affect air quality.

Exactly how such forecasts will change due to shifting policy priorities, as well as factors such as investment and demand, is yet to be seen. But due to its abundance and fewer emissions, natural gas is likely to become an even more important piece of the energy puzzle.

In the U.S., the good news is we have large reserves of natural gas. In fact, over the past five years, U.S. natural gas production has jumped 20 percent, reaching levels not seen since the 1970s. This expansion is not only advancing national and global environmental goals, but also strengthening U.S. economic and energy security by providing a secure supply of affordable fuel for U.S. consumers, as well as thousands of jobs.

While the Times story focused on all the benefits of natural gas, there’s one thing it can’t do on its own – meet the expected 35 percent increase in global energy demand from 2005 to 2030. Natural gas will play its part for sure, but we need to expand access and development of all economic energy sources to meet the needs of people and economies in the future.