Rich Nemec

Shadowing recent federal data on drought-driven upswings in the use of natural gas for power generation, the California Energy Commission (CEC) crunched some of its own statistics and found that the shift to gas preceded both the three-year drought and the closure of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) last year.

Hawaii Gas, the island state’s principal gas utility, has filed with the state regulatory commission to convert up to 30% of its synthetic natural gas (SNG) production at an Oahu-based plant to lower-cost liquefied natural gas (LNG) it plans to import from the North American mainland.

Portland General Electric (PGE) has more than a billion dollars worth of new generation coming to fruition in the next two years, and $750 million is tied up in two new natural gas-fired plants, according to PGE CEO Jim Piro.

In the first of a series of public meetings Tuesday night, the nation’s largest municipal utility, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP), unveiled an updated integrated resource plan (IRP) calling for eliminating its use of coal-fired generation by 2026 and nearly doubling its current use of natural gas-fired power supplies.

San Diego-based Royale Energy Inc., a small independent with some big plans for Alaska’s North Slope shale plays (see Shale Daily, Jan. 18, 2012), is launching a drilling program in the Sacramento Basin dry natural gas fields, following a successful well in Tehama County, 130 miles north of the state capital.

In tandem with natural gas flaring, methane emissions promise to be a growing issue for North Dakota state officials and the oil and gas industry, the head of the state environmental health section in the Department of Health (DOH) told NGI’sShale Daily on Monday.

Today’s fast-advancing technology for well design, drilling and completion on other shale plays, are not applicable to California’s Monterey Shale, a panel of local operators last week told the Oil and Gas Awards’ West Coast Energy Summit in Bakersfield, CA.

Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s (PG&E) regulatory and legal woes will not be over anytime soon, and in the meantime the combination utility continues to push back against what it considers excessive penalties proposed by state regulators, CEO Tony Earley said Tuesday.

Despite greatly reduced federal predictions for recoverable resources (see Shale Daily,May 21), California’s Monterey Shale will eventually live up to all of its previous hype unless public policy stops its full development, an official with the Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA) told an industry gathering in Bakersfield on Tuesday.