NGI Staff Reports

The woes of Philadelphia’s main gas utility, Philadelphia GasWorks (PGW), have grown to embarrassing levels as computer systemproblems, debt, and customer unhappiness continue to dominate thescene. The situation came to a head last week, as the hierarchy ofPGW testified before the Philadelphia Gas Commission during publichearings of the utility’s budget process.

Houston-based Energy Solutions Inc. (ESI), the developer of gasand risk management software GASMAN, has been acquired byLICENERGY of Denmark. The deal is intended to create a company witha larger market presence in the transaction management andconsulting arena. Energy Solutions will be renamed Energy SolutionsInternational.

California’s major natural gas industry players, some 75parties, will sit down again seeking agreement on a plan forunbundling the Southern California Gas system that has so-farresisted full opening up of intrastate and interstate transmissionand storage for all customers, large and small.

Cabot LNG, the energy division of the Boston-based industrialchemical manufacturer Cabot Corp., will be separated from theparent company with the issuance of a targeted stock as part ofslimming and trimming “value enhancement”initiatives announcedrecently.

Enron Oil & Gas (EOG) closed the share exchange to establishEOG as an independent company yesterday. Under the exchange, which wasannounced last month, Enron Corp. exchanged 62.27 million of its 82.27million shares of EOG common stock for EOG’s China and Indiaoperations (see story July 21). EOG alsocontributed $600 million to an India subsidiary that has beentransferred to Enron. In addition, EOG issued 27 million shares at$22.25 per share and received net proceeds of $578.3 million. Pendingcompletion of another convertible stock offering, Enron’s remaininginterest in the company will be less than 3%. EOG will soon adopt anew name EOG Resources Inc. Forrest E. Hoglund, EOG chairman, whoannounced his planned retirement in Sept. 1998, retired effectiveAug. 15. Mark G. Papa, formerly president and CEO, was electedchairman and CEO. Edmund P. Segner III, formerly vice chairman andchief of staff, was elected president and chief of staff.

Pacific Gas & Electric continued a high-inventory OFO thatbegan Saturday (see Daily GPI, Aug. 16)through Monday, tightening an initial tolerance of 5% for positivedaily imbalances to 2% Sunday and then loosening it again to 5%Monday. No OFO is in effect today.

The overall cash market drifted lower Friday, with quotesranging from essentially flat into Northwest for both domestic andCanadian gas to nearly 15 cents lower at the PG&E citygate. Thegeneral softness primarily was a function of the usual weekenddropoff in gas load, sources said.

Buoyed by another day of strong demand in the physical market,the futures market trended higher Friday in a choppy, range-boundtrading session. After opening just two pennies above Thursday’slow of $2.67, the September contract rumbled 2.2 cents higher onthe day to finish at $2.745.

FERC has warned it may dismiss Questar Pipeline’s applicationfor its Southern Trails Pipeline project into California if”serious deficiencies” with the filing aren’t corrected by the endof the month.