Appears

It appears the weatherman will be giving most of the U.S. a break this summer, with moderate temperatures and less of a hurricane threat than the last five years.

It appears the Guardian Pipeline project received what it wantedfor the holidays after all, even though it came a week or two late.The pipeline cleared one of the larger regulatory hurdles, as theFederal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) staff issued a FinalEnvironmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the project, deeming theconstruction and operation of the 149-mile natural gas pipelinefrom Joliet, IL, to Ixonia, WI, an acceptable environmental action.

It appears the Guardian Pipeline project received what it wantedfor the holidays afterall, even though it came a week or two late.The pipeline announced yesterday that it has cleared one of thelarger regulatory hurdles, as the Federal Energy RegulatoryCommission (FERC) Staff issued a Final Environmental ImpactStatement (EIS) on the project, deeming the construction andoperation of the 149-mile natural gas pipeline from Joliet, IL, toIxonia, WI, as an acceptable environmental action.

McMoRan Exploration Co.’s gas discovery at Eugene Island appearsto be twice as big as expected, and now is expected to recover 100Bcf of natural gas. The well, will be put into production in thesecond quarter by the New Orleans-based company, expects productionto reach 100 MMcf/d by then.

Although the sky appears to be the limit for the current gasmarket, it apparently hasn’t affected the long-term optimism of theEnergy Information Administration. EIA actually predicts priceswill begin to decline in 2002 and basically flatten out through2020. That will occur, EIA believes, despite a massive increase ingas consumption to nearly 35 Tcf by 2020.

The introduction of the 1.325 Bcf/d Alliance Pipeline into theNorth American gas market appears to have had less of an impact ongas flows out of western Canada than expected, according torepresentatives of TransCanada PipeLines, PG&E Gas Transmissionand Alliance. Extremely strong gas demand in the Pacific Northwest,California and in the Midwest has produced continued high loadfactors on TransCanada and PG&E GT-NW despite the presence oftheir huge new rival for Western Canadian supply.

The introduction of the 1.325 Bcf/d Alliance Pipeline into theNorth American gas market appears to have had less of an impact ongas flows out of western Canada than expected, according torepresentatives of TransCanada PipeLines, PG&E Gas Transmissionand Alliance. Extremely strong gas demand in the Pacific Northwest,California and in the Midwest has produced continued high loadfactors on TransCanada and PG&E GT-NW despite the presence oftheir huge new rival for Western Canadian supply.

It appears increasingly likely that development of 35 Tcf of gasreserves in Alaska and another 6-9 Tcf in the Mackenzie Deltaregion of the Northwest Territories will be headed down parallelbut separate paths. Both projects, however, seem to be picking upspeed in reaction to the current favorable market situation.

There appears to be one issue that Republicans and Democrats onCapitol Hill can agree on — gas prices are too high. ChairmanFrank H. Murkowski (R-AK) of the Senate Energy Committee andRanking Minority Member Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) have called for anoversight hearing to look into rising natural gas prices.