Promax Energy entered into a farmout joint venture agreement with Trident Exploration Corp. of Calgary to develop coalbed methane (CBM) under its Cessford properties in Alberta. Terms of the joint venture include a 12-well pilot program with all costs of the test borne by Trident, which will earn the right to commence a commercial drilling project on customary oil and gas industry terms. CBM production has become a significant and rapidly growing source of natural gas supply in the U.S., and interest is increasing in the CBM potential of Western Canadian coals. The Promax acreage hosts both shallow and deeper coal seams of interest. “The extensive and contiguous Promax land position, coupled with its database of logs, samples and seismic lines, will allow Trident to move rapidly in identifying the most prospective areas and starting a pilot project,” said Trident President Jon Baker. “Access to the Promax gas infrastructure and drilling economies will enhance the commercial potential for CBM development.” Promax is focused on natural gas in southeastern Alberta. It is well positioned to play a key role in the development of 500,000 acres of shallow gas in the Cessford area of Alberta, including platform production from the Medicine Hat/Milk River zones and potential higher productivity from up to 15 other horizons.

Excelergy Corp. is working with Microsoft to combine key elements of the Microsoft .NET application development platform with Excelergy’s open, component-based, native XML technology platform to deliver advanced web services for the energy and utility industries. Web services are collaborative, Internet-based services that make systems, applications and programs more interoperable through common communication standards. Next-generation Web services are unique in their ability to fully automate critical business and operational processes with little or no human intervention. They lead to quicker, more efficient, more accurate information delivery and collaborative exchange. “Microsoft is committed to promoting open standards and technologies that everyone can use to develop and deploy web services. As widespread adoption emerges, we are going to see more of the groundbreaking benefits web services offer businesses, including dramatically increased productivity,” said Peter Boit, vice president of the Microsoft .NET Solutions Group. “With companies like Excelergy utilizing Microsoft .NET technologies, the energy industry will be able to take advantage of the next wave of software services and realize bottom-line benefits that benefit their company and their customers.” Prior to Web services, a company’s systems were often collections of different proprietary applications and platforms using different standards that were not well integrated and could not efficiently exchange information. Standards-based Web services promote easy integration of these disparate applications and systems, both within and across a company’s firewalls. Web services are being developed using open, XML-based, World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) approved software standards, including SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol), WSDL (Web Services Description Language), and UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery and Integration). All of Excelergy’s products use XML and XML-based standards, including SOAP and WSDL. More information is available at www.excelergy.com.

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