PNM Resources has joined a group that is designed to aid passage of a climate bill through Congress. This comes after PNM dropped out of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce because of the Chamber’s anti-climate change legislation stance.

PNM joined the American Businesses for Clean Energy (ABCE), the New Mexico Business Weekly reported.

“We join a few other utilities, the Gap, Aspen ski area and 15 or so others in this initial effort and encourage New Mexico businesses who want to be listed to add their names to the list,” PNM spokesman Don Brown said in a written statement to New Mexico Business Weekly.

The liberal magazine Mother Jones called the group the “Anti-Chamber” and notes that PNM is already a member of a similar group.

The U.S. Climate Action Partnership, launched in January 2007, is a business-environmental coalition that includes 26 major companies, and crafted a blueprint for climate legislation in January that became the framework for both the House and Senate bills. Two USCAP members—FPL, a Florida utility, and PNM—are also part of the new coalition.

According to the ABCE Web site, the mission of the group is to “Demonstrate large and small business support for Congressional enactment of clean energy and climate legislation that will significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

The group currently includes “More than a dozen leading U.S. corporations — including Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG), DB Climate Change Advisors (Deutsche Bank Group), Gap Inc., and National Grid,” according to a release (pdf) from the group.