Closer

The dismantling of former gas and power titan Aquila Inc. moved a step closer to completion Wednesday. Great Plains Energy Inc., the parent company of Kansas City Power & Light, received approval from its shareholders to issue common stock for its acquisition of Aquila.

The Neptune Deepwater Port, the offshore liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility to be located 10 miles off the coast of Gloucester, MA, is one step closer to reality after SUEZ LNG NA LLC received all of the necessary permits from state officials in Massachusetts. The LNG terminal, which will deliver 400-750 MMcf/d of natural gas to New England markets, is expected to ramp up in 2009.

The Neptune Deepwater Port, the offshore liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility to be located 10 miles off the coast of Gloucester, MA, is one step closer to reality after SUEZ LNG NA LLC received all of the necessary permits from state officials in Massachusetts. The LNG terminal, which will deliver 400-750 MMcf/d of natural gas to New England markets, is expected to ramp up in 2009.

Sempra Energy’s multi-billion-dollar bets on expanded liquefied natural gas (LNG), interstate pipeline and storage capacity are coming closer to payoff, and CEO Donald Felsinger assured financial analysts Thursday that all of the critical projects are on track. Leading the way is the $800 million, 1 Bcf/d capacity Costa Azul LNG terminal along the Pacific Coast of North Baja, about 60 miles south of the U.S. border.

A coalition of 19 Senate Democrats led by Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico has called on Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne to take a closer look at several issues surrounding an oil and natural gas lease sale that is scheduled for September in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A).

Three British bankers wanted in the United States on Enron Corp.-related fraud charges are one step closer to being extradited back to the United States for trial after a European court refused to halt extradition proceedings.

The usual suspects — BP plc, ConocoPhillips, Sempra Energy, Coral and Chevron — once again led NGI’s Top 20 List of North American natural gas marketers for 1Q2006. But a closer look at the numbers and recent headlines reveal an evolving cast of characters. Sempra tumbled from its long-held second spot, ConocoPhillips, Coral and Louis Dreyfus showed strong sequential gains, and big-time U.S. gas producer Chesapeake Energy Corp. edged into the rankings.

A closer look at 27 U.S. gas storage systems shows that as many as 20 of them, including the massive Columbia system, National Fuel, Tennessee Gas, Southern Natural and others, could be full well before the end of the storage injection season this year, leaving a substantial amount of gas supply stranded and potentially shut in, according to an analysis by Golden, CO-based consulting firm Bentek Energy.

A new Canadian subarctic exploration campaign is developing — closer to market than the contested Mackenzie Gas Project — after a group led by Husky Energy Inc. chalked up its second drilling success in the central Northwest Territories.