El Paso Merchant Energy said a final FERC order issued this week paves the way for it to receive a final $70 million payment from a Goldman Sachs subsidiary for East Coast Power LLC, which owns the gas-fired 940 MW Linden cogeneration facility adjacent to Staten Island in Linden, NJ. The total purchase price paid for the plant was $450 million. At closing in October, GS Linden Power Holdings LLC, paid $380 million with the remainder to follow FERC’s approval. El Paso also announced that it agreed to sell its interest in Mohawk River Funding IV to a subsidiary of Bear Stearns for $4.5 million in cash and the assumption of $75 million in debt. El Paso said MRF IV was formed to securitize a long-term power contract with Connecticut Light and Power Co. While the MRF IV debt is non-recourse to El Paso, the company has, nevertheless, included it and other similar debt when calculating its total obligations senior to common stock. The transaction is subject to FERC approval and is expected to close in February 2004.

Range Resources completed its $85 million acquisition of 80 Bcfe of proved reserves on 32,000 net acres in West Texas. The properties are adjacent to the company’s Conger Field properties in Sterling County and include more than 500 wells with current net production in excess of 14 MMcfe/d of gas. An associated 400-mile gathering system that collects and transports the properties’ production also was acquired. A development program will be initiated in 2004 to increase production over the course of the next three years. “With this acquisition, Range becomes the largest operator in the Conger Field with a concentration of more than 800 wells in the area,” said Range President John H. Pinkerton. “Given the recent success of our drilling program and the benefits of this acquisition, we now anticipate production to increase by 10% to 15% next year.”

ChevronTexaco with joint venture partners ExxonMobil Canada and Imperial Oil Resources acquired exploration rights for eight deepwater parcels in the Orphan Basin region offshore Newfoundland. The parcels cover more than five million acres in the unexplored basin, which is located about 250 miles east-northeast of St. John’s and 155 miles north of the Hibernia oil field in water depths from about 6,500 to 8,200 feet. Ownership of the parcels is as follows: ChevronTexaco (50%); ExxonMobil Canada (25%); and Imperial Oil (25%).

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