Affect

Rockies Express (REX) said it has postponed until March previously scheduled Feb. 24-25 maintenance at its Lost Creek booster station, which will affect nominations at the Lost Creek Sweetwater location. REX will post the new dates for this outage in its March maintenance schedule.

Any concerns that recent changes to the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) natural gas storage reporting sampling process might affect energy markets appear unfounded as the government agency reported that the old and new samples were not much different, but that the new sampling procedure produced more accurate estimates.

In a decision that could affect hundreds of power plants and other sources of air pollution nationwide, a federal appeals court recently struck down an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule preventing states and local governments from imposing stricter emissions-monitoring limits than those set down by federal authorities.

Any concerns that recent changes to the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) natural gas storage reporting sampling process might affect energy markets appear unfounded as the government agency reported that the old and new samples were not much different, but that the new sampling procedure produced more accurate estimates.

In a decision that could affect hundreds of power plants and other sources of air pollution nationwide, a federal appeals court on Tuesday struck down an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule preventing states and local governments from imposing stricter emissions-monitoring limits than those set down by federal authorities.

British Columbia (BC) is joining the states of Alaska, Washington, Oregon and California to collaborate on energy and climate issues that affect the entire Pacific Coast region under an agreement announced at the annual meeting of the Western Governors’ Association.

Nabors Industries Ltd., the largest land driller in the world, “recently” has begun to see a weakening in several of its U.S. Lower 48 operating areas and is uncertain how much it may affect industry rig counts and rates, CEO Gene Isenberg said last week. A “significant” reduction in spot market rates is likely in some areas, although he said any contraction in North American natural gas drilling is likely to be “shallow and brief.”

CIG declared a Strained Operating Condition that took effect Wednesday until further notice. “In anticipation of the cold weather forecast to affect our market region combined with high firm transportation load factors, CIG is concerned that its ability to absorb imbalances caused by mismatches between scheduled receipts and deliveries and to accept imbalance payback nominations will be very limited,” the pipeline said, adding that it may implement performance caps at locations not operating at scheduled flow rates. In addition, high demand for authorized overrun storage withdrawals may require CIG to allocate capacity among requesting shippers, it said.

Citing costs that will not affect future quarters, PG&E Corp. Wednesday reported decreased earnings for the second quarter and six-month year-to-date periods. Consolidated second quarter net income in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) was $232 million, or 65 cents/share, compared with $267 million, or 70 cents/share, for the same period in 2005. (All the per-share numbers are on a diluted basis, the utility holding company said.)