Combined

Southern Union Co. said its Southern Union Gas Services (SUGS) midstream business will construct a 200 MMcf/d gas processing plant and associated gathering, compression and treating facilities to serve growing production from the Avalon, Bone Spring and Wolfcamp plays of West Texas and Southeast New Mexico.

Schlumberger Ltd. is seeing continued strength in its North American operations in part because of its hydraulic fracturing (fracking) technology, which is reducing time and costs to complete a well, management said Friday.

Expanded use of combined heat and power (CHP) systems, which recover and make use of waste heat from power generation, could be a means of growing demand for Marcellus Shale natural gas, according to the Commonwealth Recycled Energy Economic Development Alliance (CREEDA).

August natural gas suffered a double-digit loss Wednesday as a combination of front-month selling and spread trading combined to pummel futures. Traders are also anticipating the release of modestly bearish inventory figures from the government Thursday. At the close August had fallen 14.6 cents to $4.217 and September had given up 14.9 cents to $4.222. August crude oil slipped 24 cents to $96.65/bbl.

Drilling in the Haynesville Shale helped Louisiana more than double its natural gas production in April from two years ago, and production in the Lower 48 states increased 10.6% (6.66 Bcf/d) to 69.05 Bcf/d during the same time period, according to the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) monthly natural gas report.

Prices declined, mostly by double digits, across the board Thursday as a relative lack of substantive cooling demand combined with the previous day’s 7.1-cent dip in July futures to bring bearish pressure on the cash market.

Pennsylvania most likely won’t see a tax or fee on shale development this summer.

The chairman of Energy Transfer Equity LP (ETE) said Thursday the merger with natural gas pipeline giant Southern Union Co. (SUG) will give the combined company more customer market access across the United States and alleviate growing takeaway issues in some burgeoning shale plays.

A $619 million, 580 MW natural gas-fired combined-cycle electric generation plant has begun commercial operation in Virginia, according to owner/operator, Dominion Virginia Power. The Bear Garden Power Station is in the central part of the state, about 60 miles west of Richmond. Construction began in spring 2009. Bear Garden has two gas-fired combustion turbines, with oil as a backup fuel source. The turbines each generate 170 MW, and their exhaust is used to generate an additional 240 MW.