Building

Panda Energy International Inc. and PSEG Americas, part ofPublic Service Enterprise Group, announced 50-50 joint ventureTexas Independent Energy to develop and operate high efficiency,low-cost electric power generating plants in Texas.

CMS Energy Corp. last week continued building what’s shaping up to be a Powder River Basin dynasty. Subsidiary CMS Continental Natural Gas agreed with Pennaco Energy, and CMS corporate affiliate CMS Oil and Gas to gather coal-bed methane gas from the Powder River Basin in Wyoming and Montana.

ONEOK Inc. is building up its midstream presence by agreeing toacquire all the Oklahoma midstream gas gathering and processingassets of Koch Midstream Enterprises for $285 million in cash.

ONEOK Inc. is building up its midstream presence by agreeing toacquire all the Oklahoma midstream gas gathering and processingassets of Koch Midstream Enterprises for $285 million in cash.

Florida Power Corp. filed plans with the Florida Public ServiceCommission to accelerate the building of a second generation unitat its Hines Energy Complex in Polk County. The unit will provideadditional capability to meet growing demand for electricity wellinto the next century. The company has offered to absorbconstruction costs for the plant in its current customer rates.

Joseph P. Kearney, 52, a leading figure in the energy servicesindustry responsible for building the nation’s largest independentelectric generation producer, died of an apparent heart attackwhile in Washington, D.C., Oct. 3 to attend a charity dinner forthe Lombardi Cancer Research Foundation.

KN Energy will not be building its Front Runner Pipeline projectthis year as originally planned but may begin construction by nextsummer in time for service in November 1999, a company spokesmansaid yesterday. KN originally intended to have the project inservice for the upcoming heating season. Despite receiving anoptional certificate on the project from FERC in July, the companystill has not lined up the required customer commitments to moveforward.

Instead of spending much time and money building a larger directmarketing operation, Aquila Energy has formed a gas marketingpartnership with Empire District Electric Co., a Midcontinentregion electric utility, to target industrial customers in Empire’selectric service territory. Aquila said the deal is the first ofmultiple partnerships and alliances it plans to form in four keyregions of the country where the market is competitive and it has asignificant presence.

Dynegy Inc. – formerly NGC Corp. – plans to construct agas-fired, four-unit, 600 MW generation facility in RockinghamCounty, NC, and Duke Power, the electric utility of Duke Energysigned a letter of intent to buy the 600 MW of capacity and energygenerated by the power plant.