After historically having about one-third of its fuel supplies available right in its own backyard from local production, the port city of Long Beach, CA Tuesday went into the market for up to 10 Bcf of supplies for between one and five years to serve this city of nearly half a million 25 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles.

A newly conceived, state-government-backed 49 MW power plant in the port is taking away the city’s local supplies, according to Chris Garner, the Long Beach Energy Department’s general manager. Los Angeles-based Occidental Petroleum is at the center of the power plant development and could be a supplier of gas to the city if it chooses to bid on the supply Request for Qualifications (RFQ) released Tuesday. The city’s energy department provides natural gas and water to the city’s residents and business, along with supplying electricity to city facilities.

“The natural gas supplies (now going to the power plant) were our baseload volumes,” said Garner. He noted that initially when the power plant starts up in December it will be bypassing the city gas utility’s pipes with supplies directly from Oxy, which is the surviving member of an oil/gas producers’ consortium that used to operate the oil production in the area for the state. Eventually the city may serve the power plant by swapping for the local supplies with some of the newly contracted gas.

The power plant has the physical option of delivering its own gas or taking supplies from the city utility. It is being built in response to the state’s power crisis two years ago as a means of supplying the oil/gas production operations with its own source of power.

Long Beach’s energy department Tuesday officially solicited qualifications from natural gas suppliers to deliver a firm supply of gas to the Southern California Gas Co.’s pipeline system for redelivery to Long Beach Energy’s service territory.

The department noted that the RFQ “is to solicit, evaluate and select, through a competitive solicitation process, one or more suppliers that can deliver a firm, long-term supply of natural gas and provide the best value to the city.” The department’s customer load profile is approximately 50% residential and 50% commercial/industrial.

Long Beach Energy said the term of the supply would begin April 1, 2003 with a minimum of one year and up to a maximum of five years. Currently, the department said total annual throughput is approximately 13 Bcf, which consists of 10 Bcf sales and 3 Bcf in transportation. The average sales volume is 35 MMcf/d with a peak demand of 65 MMcf/d and a minimum total demand of 14 MMcf/d.

Long Beach Energy said all RFQs must be received no later than 4 p.m. (PST) Nov. 18. Additional information and copies of the RFQ can be obtained by contacting Alyce McCall, manager of energy services for Long Beach, at (562) 570-2060.

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