Charge

A section of California’s global climate change law (AB 32) empowers state air pollution regulators to charge fees on providers of fuels that contribute to the state’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. But it is still unclear how officials intend to collect an estimated $54 million in fees during the next three years. Natural gas and electric utilities are confounded with the user-fee approach to paying for the six-year implementation of the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.

Dismal gas prices and a charge for Rockies basis hedges took their toll on Questar Corp. in the first quarter, but CEO Keith Rattie said the company is “weathering the storm” as he looks to a Nymex forward curve that “remains in steep contango” and growing production that will be worth a lot more as the economy and gas market recover.

A Texas lawmaker wants to charge a 25 cent/boe fee for the transfer of liquefied natural gas (LNG), crude oil and petroleum products to or from marine terminals in order to support a $20 million fund that would pay for measures to combat coastal erosion. However, it is in doubt whether the fee would be in compliance with the U.S. Constitution.

Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Friday published a final rule that allows it to charge oil and natural gas pipelines, power transmission companies and fiber optics firms higher rental fees for linear rights-of-way (ROW) to reflect the changes in land values over the past two decades.

Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is expected to publish a final rule Friday that will give it the green light to charge oil and natural gas pipelines, power transmission companies and fiber optics firms higher rental fees for linear rights-of-way (ROW) to better reflect the changes in land values over the past two decades.

The American Petroleum Institute (API) has disputed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) charge that producers are “not paying royalties to the taxpayer” for oil and natural gas production on federal lands and the federal Outer Continental Shelf. Pelosi made the accusation Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

California’s so-called “public goods” charge paid by all customers of the state’s private-sector utilities is the focus of a confrontation between the natural gas utilities and the independent consumer unit at the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). The head-knocking will come to a close at an oral argument the CPUC will hold Aug. 25.

Westcoast reported completing repairs to the #10 sulfur train at its Fort Nelson Gas Plant and lifted the associated 5% Firm H2S (hydrogen sulfide) Overproduction Charge constraint at the start of Thursday’s gas day.

Quick. Name a female CEO in charge of an oil and gas company in the United States. There may be a handful, but in a business dominated by men, Lisa Stewart stands out.