The Clean Energy Works coalition has launched an ad campaign designed to counter the oil and gas industry’s public relations offensive. The ads, which promote climate and energy bills, call the oil and gas industry’s advertisements a “multimillion-dollar smear campaign to stop clean energy legislation.”

“The clean energy bill will produce more power here in America for us,” a narrator says in the ad. “And Big Oil knows that means less dependence on them.”

The six-figure ad buy is running for one week on national cable television.

The ads come less than a week after the American Petroleum Institute rolled out two television ads saying that new oil and gas taxes are a bad idea.

“While the focus of our industry is on helping BP stop the [Gulf of Mexico] spill and clean up the crude oil, we cannot ignore the fact that imposing significant new taxes on the oil and gas industry will have severe economic consequences and job impacts,” API President Jack Gerard said Saturday as he announced the campaign.

The API’s ads are running in 10 states: Colorado, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia and started Tuesday.

The Clean Energy Works’ campaign is the latest push by clean energy advocates to draw attention to climate change legislation.

The American Values Network is running ads pushing for climate change bills that target Sarah Palin. Those spots are running online and on D.C. buses.

The Service Employees International Union, Sierra Club, Vote Vets and other supporters of climate change bills are also running ads targeting Senators such as Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.).