Bidding

With Canada’s natural gas production and storage levels at historical lows, Lehman Brothers analysts said Wednesday that Canadians likely will bid gas away from U.S. consumers and possibly storage, setting the stage for bullish gas prices.

With Canada’s natural gas production and storage levels at historical lows, Lehman Brothers analysts said Wednesday that Canadians likely will bid gas away from U.S. consumers and possibly storage, setting the stage for bullish gas prices.

Guardian Pipeline has hired H.C. Price Co. to build its 142-mile, 750 MMcf/d pipeline system in Illinois and Wisconsin. H.C. Price, of Dallas, was selected in a competitive bidding process and will construct the pipeline in one spread, in which work will be done by a single construction crew over the entire length of the project. Murphy Bros. Inc., of Moline, IL, was selected to build Guardian’s 22,225-hp compressor station near Joliet. “This signing of the project’s main construction contractors keeps Guardian on track to meet its scheduled in-service date this November,” said George Hass, Guardian project manager. Land acquisition work is continuing in both Wisconsin and Illinois. Construction is expected to begin on the compressor station in March and on the pipeline June 1, with completion and operation of the pipeline expected by November. Guardian will transport gas from interconnections with Alliance, Northern Border, Midwestern Gas Transmission and Natural Gas Pipeline Company of America at the Chicago hub near Joliet to northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin markets. The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin has approved a lateral pipeline connecting Guardian with the Wisconsin Gas system. Currently Guardian Pipeline has firm precedent agreements with Wisconsin Gas and others to transport 662 MMcf/d (88% of design capacity) when the pipeline goes into service in November. Guardian is a partnership of CMS Energy, Wisconsin Gas parent company WICOR, and Viking Gas Transmission, a wholly owned subsidiary of Xcel Energy Inc.

Bidding is expected to be high for two Minerals Management Service Gulf of Mexico sales this summer, one that focuses on a region of the Central Gulf that has been a no man’s land for exploration and production, and another in the Western Gulf. Part of the attraction will be the added incentives for drillers, which MMS is using to increase domestic oil and gas production.

Bidding is expected to be high for two Minerals Management Service Gulf of Mexico sales this summer, one that focuses on a region of the Central Gulf that has been a no man’s land for exploration and production, and another in the Western Gulf. Part of the attraction will be the added incentives for drillers, which MMS is using to increase domestic oil and gas production.

Class action lawsuits are bidding to overtake politicalfinger-pointing as more prevalent this week in the increasinglymurky California energy landscape. The cities of Los Angeles andLong Beach filed separate class action suits Wednesday in LosAngeles Superior Court against Sempra Energy’s two utilitycompanies and El Paso Natural Gas Co. for allegedly conspiring inthe mid-1990s to block the development of two new interstate gaspipelines into the state, resulting in excessively high prices atthe California-Arizona border. Action by the court is not expectedany time soon, according to Long Beach’s city attorney.

The Oil & Gas Asset Clearinghouse, which conducts live floorand Internet bidding on oil and gas properties and prospects, soldmore than $34.4 million of properties at its ninth hybrid auctionheld Dec. 13. The Clearinghouse’s Selective Offering auctioned 321lots that consisted of more than 1,200 wells.

Houston-based Dynegy Marketing and Trade has beat out some ofthe top natural gas producers in the nation in the latest round ofbidding for Minerals Management Service’s royalty-in kind gasproduced from federal leases in the Gulf of Mexico.

Houston-based Dynegy Marketing and Trade has beat out some ofthe top natural gas producers in the nation in the latest round ofbidding for Minerals Management Service’s royalty-in kind gasproduced from federal leases in the Gulf of Mexico.