2006

A decision last month in which FERC reversed its policy on negotiated rates by allowing pipelines to enter into transactions tied to natural gas basis differentials “has now unleashed again a regulatory regime which will permit market manipulation,” BP America Production Co. and affiliate BP Energy told FERC this week.

Enron Corp.’s former corporate secretary acknowledged Wednesday that less than a month before the company declared bankruptcy, she told founder Kenneth Lay in a note that his leadership was “invaluable.” However, under cross-examination, Paula Rieker remained polite and seemingly unflappable, as the defense team for Lay and ex-CEO Jeffrey Skilling attempted to undo her previous testimony.

FERC on Thursday revoked the market-based rate authority of eight companies for failure to comply with regulations requiring electric quarterly reports (EQRs). In addition, six other companies were put on notice that their market-based rate authority would be revoked unless they comply with Commission regulations and file their reports within 15 days.

Just the act of opening up an additional two million acres in Lease Sale 181 in the Central Gulf of Mexico with the prospect of substantial new supplies of natural gas in the relatively near term “will help to mitigate natural gas prices,” an industry representative testified in a Senate hearing Thursday.

Impending fresh invasions of the northern U.S. by frigid air from Canada, along with forecasts indicating that the current cold spell will last through at least next week, helped push prices higher by mostly moderate amounts at a majority of points Wednesday. A few instances of flat numbers were also in the mix.

BG Alaska E&P Inc. is entering the Foothills area of Alaska’s North Slope through a participation agreement with Anadarko Petroleum Corp. and Petro-Canada (Alaska) Inc. The BG Group subsidiary is taking a one-third equity share of 2.1 million acres; Anadarko will be the operator.

Independent producers blasted the Bush administration’s decision to cut oil and gas research and development (R&D) funding to zero in both the Department of Energy’s (DOE) $23.5 billion budget for fiscal year 2007 and from the R&D program specified in the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

Calling it a proposed transmission “superhighway,” American Electric Power (AEP) last Tuesday filed with FERC and PJM Interconnection to build a new 765-kV transmission line stretching from West Virginia to New Jersey. The projected cost is approximately $3 billion.

Florida’s two senators introduced legislation last week that was billed as a compromise with the energy industry — it would establish a permanent no-drilling zone in much of the eastern Gulf of Mexico to shield Florida and a military training area from energy production, and would make a limited amount of additional acreage in the natural gas-prone Lease Sale 181 available to producers.