By Drew DeSilver,The Seattle Times

PUGET ISLAND, Wash. – The energy future of the Pacific Northwest is headed straight for Frans and Mieke Eykel’s backyard.

The Eykels have lived on this low-slung, bucolic strip of land in the Columbia River for 11 years. Frans, a retired aviation maintenance engineer, says they can identify the different vessels that ply the river – grain barges, cruise ships, oil tankers – by sound alone.

But the prospect of new ships – transports carrying millions of gallons of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to a proposed terminal across the Columbia – has the Eykels fuming.

Four separate LNG terminals have been proposed for the mouth of the Columbia River, prompting opposition from many nearby residents. Mieke Eykel said she can’t believe “they could even think about putting something so ugly in such a beautiful place.”

But the Eykels may be fighting an even larger battle than they realize. Encouraged by soaring prices, projections of increased demand and recent changes in federal law, the natural-gas industry has big plans for the Northwest:

-For the first time in 20 years, test wells are being drilled in the high, dry country of Eastern Washington. EnCana, Canada’s largest gas producer, is leading the way; others have leased vast tracts nearby.

-A Canadian start-up has drilled five test wells in the Coos Bay area in Oregon, looking for gas. Another company has proposed an LNG terminal there to unload and store the liquefied fuel before it’s pumped into gas pipelines.

-Puget Sound Energy is in the midst of a major expansion of its Jackson Prairie gas-storage field near Chehalis, already the third-largest such facility in the world.

-Energy Northwest, formerly the Washington Public Power Supply System, has proposed building a $1 billion complex at the Port of Kalama, in Cowlitz County, that would synthesize gas from crushed coal and use it to generate electricity.

Many of these projects could be done in by politics, economics or both. But the Energy Policy Act passed this summer, which gives federal rather than state regulators the main authority over siting decisions, increases the odds that new LNG terminals will be built.

The Northwest projects are part of a nationwide push by the industry and the federal government to make gas a bigger piece of the U.S. energy pie. Since other parts of the country will be using more gas, too, industry officials say, it’s imperative to get more gas flowing to, and through, this region.

“The Northwest is competing with other markets for natural gas,” said Kent Robertson, a spokesman for San Jose, Calif.-based Calpine, a national operator of gas-fired power plants that has two Pacific Northwest sites. “The pipelines that serve the Northwest have the ability to send gas to Chicago, too.”

For decades, this region has enjoyed relatively cheap natural gas because it is one of the few markets connected by pipeline to two major gas-producing areas: western Canada and the Rocky Mountain states.

Almost 60 percent of the gas used in the region generates electricity or powers paper factories, food-processing plants and other industrial facilities; less than a quarter of it heats homes or cooks food.

After peaking in 2001 during the West Coast power crisis, regional gas demand fell as the Northwest aluminum industry all but vanished. Now gas use is rebounding, driven by population growth and economic recovery.

The Northwest Gas Association, which represents major gas utilities and pipeline operators, expects total gas use in Washington, Oregon and Idaho to hit a new peak in the 2006-07 heating season. And the association projects that consumption will increase 19 percent by 2009-10, driven mainly by power generation and home use.

Not everyone agrees. The Northwest Power and Conservation Council, a federally authorized regional planning agency, thinks the high cost and price volatility of gas will limit its use in power plants. Terry Morlan, the council’s director of power planning, says conservation and alternative energy sources, such as wind and coal gasification, will also help meet energy demand.

Meanwhile, Northwest gas exploration is stirring after two decades of slumber.

Calgary-based EnCana, which specializes in producing gas from unconventional sources, has leased 800,000 acres of private and public land in and around Grant County, drilling one 14,000-foot test well and planning at least one more, spokesman Alan Boras said.

Back in the 1980s, Shell found gas in the Columbia basin, but not enough to extract commercially. Since then, Boras said, technology has advanced to make it easier, and cheaper, to recover gas from the tight sandstone beds beneath much of southeastern Washington.

Speculators have been snapping up oil and gas leases near where EnCana is drilling. More than 175,000 acres of federal land has been leased in Grant County alone in the past three years, according to Bureau of Land Management records.

In Coos Bay, Vancouver, B.C.-based Torrent Energy is searching for coalbed methane, a form of natural gas that nestles in coal seams. Torrent has leased 99,000 acres of public and private land in the Coos Bay area. With an Australian partner, it is leasing an additional 100,000 acres for exploration in Southwest Washington from Weyerhaeuser.

Early this month, the Washington state Department of Natural Resources (DNR) leased 65,000 acres of state land in the Columbia basin for gas and 16,500 acres near Chehalis for coalbed methane exploration.

“Industry is keenly interested in finding new accumulations (of gas), and the Columbia River basin has that potential,” said Bill Lingley, DNR’s chief geologist.

But, Lingley cautioned, exploration is a long way from production. “I think the odds of a commercial discovery are good, but I also think the odds of your readers getting into a traffic accident tonight are better.”

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