The oil and gas industry isn’t exactly known as a bastion of equality between the sexes. According to an industry study the workforce in 2010 was 81 percent male nationwide. Tracee Bentley, the new executive director of the Colorado Petroleum Council, is leading the group’s effort to bring more women into the industry with the Women in Power program.

“This is so exciting if you are a woman in Colorado, I believe,” Bentley said. “The oil and natural gas industry in Colorado is a great place for women to thrive, regardless of their career paths.”

Only 3 percent of women had ever even applied for a job in the industry, and of those who hadn’t, 63 percent said they didn’t think they had the right background.

“I think there’s an assumption out there that in order to work in oil and natural gas you need to be an engineer, or you need to be very specialized,” Bentley said. “We’re hoping to educate people to understand the oil and gas industry is such a diverse place to work. We need everything. We need land negotiators, we need engineers, we need CEOs, we need welders, we HR specialists. I mean, really the whole gamut, and these are all things that women can do.”

The Petroleum Council has been sponsoring events to encourage more women to take the plunge – one for prominent women in the state, another for high school students and college freshman and a third, scheduled for Friday, for middle schoolers.

Around 150 of Denver’s most influential women leaders gathered on June 3 at the kickoff of the Women in Power initiative to discuss the study. Democratic strategist Celinda Lake and Republican strategist Linda DiVall, who co-wrote the study, gave the keynote addresses.

Last Thursday, more than 250 high school- and college-aged girls got together for seminars and the chance to interact with trailblazing women. American Petroleum Institute Senior Economic Advisor Rayola Dougher and Anadarko Petroleum Government Affairs Manager Chantell Taylor were on hand to speak with attendees. Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice Nancy Rice was the keynote speaker. Eight $500 scholarship were handed out to college-bound attendees.

This week, middle-school age girls will be encouraged to explore more science, technology, engineering and math subjects at an event at Metropolitan State University. “Now we’re getting to the heart of the issue,” Bentley said.

She noted that fifth- and sixth-grade girls often say math is a favorite subject but that by the next few grades, math drops to their least favorite.

“Something, whether we know exactly what it is, happens to girls in that period of their lives with science and math,” Bentley said. “The good news is, we’ve identified that interesting gap there now we’ve got to do something about it.”

Bentley joined the Colorado Petroleum Council earlier this year after working in the governor’s office. She grew up in the San Luis Valley – her family farms there – and spent her high school years in Buena Vista. She worked briefly for Sen. Ben Nighthorse-Campbell in Washington, D.C., and then at the Colorado Farm Bureau.

“Rural issues are in my blood,” she said, adding, “I really liked energy, along with all the other ag issues, and energy, of course, is a rural issue.”

After receiving undergraduate and graduate degrees from Colorado State University, she went to work for the Governor’s Energy Office under Bill Ritter.

“Gov. [John] Hickenlooper wanted to reform the office so it was all encompassing, so it wasn’t just renewable energy, he wanted it to be all of the above,” she said.

She worked to develop legislation and funding for the office’s new mission. After finishing that, Hickenlooper asked her to he his legislative director and senior advisor on energy and agriculture. “My two favorite things,” she said with a smile.

She took over as executive director of the Colorado Petroleum Council with an aim toward finding bipartisan solutions to energy issues.

“I think one of the greatest myths out there is that the oil and natural gas industry, is that we’re partisan, that we only work with Republicans,” Bentley said. “And I think that one of the reasons why that American Petroleum Institute was interested in my background is because I have an history of work with both sides of the aisle, because I worked for the governor, who is a Democrat. I happen not to be a Democrat, I’m a Republican who comes from rural Colorado.”

“The unique and cool thing about API and the Colorado Petroleum Council is we cover everything, from soup to nuts, in the oil and natural gas industry,” she continued. “We cover everything from transportation, upstream, downstream, midstream, service companies. And I’m not sure there’s another organization that covers literally all of that.”

Bentley acknowledged that the plunging price of oil has led to tough economic times in the industry.

“The oil and gas industry in Colorado, for all intents and purposes, is still very strong,” she said. “Other states have taken perhaps larger economic hits than we have and that’s based on a whole variety of factors.”

One of those factors, she said, is that the state has a regulatory structure in place when prices dip below a certain margin.

“Luckily in Colorado we have a very robust regulatory system and a good relationship with the state regulators,” Bentley said. “I feel very, very confident saying, I don’t know when, but industry will be back, maybe stronger than it was before. Colorado is one of the leading industry states in the country. So when the prices get better, we’ll be among the first to feel that.”

– rachel@coloradostatesman.com