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Shell Canada Ltd. is looking for a partner to help develop its gassy Chinook leasehold, 102,000 acres in the Nikanassin Formation, a shale play in the Deep Basin of Western Canada.

The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) issued 262 permits for Marcellus Shale drilling and operators reported drilling 154 wells into the formation in June, according to information released Monday.

PacifiCorp proposes to nearly cut in half the proportion of its electricity that comes from coal-fired generators, along with building a new 637 MW natural gas-fired plant in Utah during the next 10 years, according to a revised integrated resource plan (IRP) submitted to Idaho regulators by the company’s Rocky Mountain Power utility. The Idaho Public Utilities Commission will take comments on the IRP, including its plan to cut reliance on coal from its current 62.5% portion of the PacifiCorp portfolio to 36.3% by 2020. For gas-fired generation, the 637 MW Lake Side generation plant is planned to be in place in Utah County by mid-2014, and bids for another gas-fired plant are called for late this year for a facility that can be online in 2016. Over the next 10 years, the proportion of generation from natural gas is expected to increase to 25.5% from its current 11.7% level.

Relatively moderate heat levels in the Mid-South and Northeast, along with mild to cool forecasts for Canada, the Pacific Northwest and sections of the Midwest, failed to prevent a large majority of locations from realizing small price gains Tuesday. However, inland California was beginning to join much of the desert Southwest in anticipating highs ranging from the mid 90s to more than 110, and the Rockies — while still fairly moderate — had predicted peak temperatures start to climb into the low 80s.

Southern California Gas did not extend a high-linepack OFO beyond Wednesday,

Mexico’s first liquefied natural gas (LNG) receiving terminal, which opened five years ago along the Gulf of Mexico coast, has been sold by its tripartite owners to Dutch-based Royal Vopak NV and Spain’s Enagas SA, it was announced Friday. Vopak will be the majority owner (60%).

Mexico’s first liquefied natural gas (LNG) receiving terminal, which opened five years ago along the Gulf of Mexico coast, has been sold by its tripartite owners to Dutch-based Royal Vopak NV and Spain’s Enagas SA, it was announced Friday. Vopak will be the majority owner (60%).

California regulators last Thursday agreed to shut two natural gas-fired electric generation units along the Southern California coast as a means of facilitating the development of a new gas-fired facility inland in eastern Los Angeles County.

Thanks to recent upgrades to a compression station in northeastern Pennsylvania, Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. increased its Marcellus Shale production 35% in a single day, a sign of how infrastructure bottlenecks in Appalachia are crimping production rates.