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Officials overseeing Mexico’s multiple-service contract (MSC) project took comments from the government, outside consultants and potential contractors before agreeing to move their first natural gas contract bidding dates to February instead of December. The extra time, they said, will be used by Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) to add new public works laws into the contracts, as well as give bidders the opportunity to include possible exploration and development costs in next year’s budgets.

The New York State Public Service Commission (NYPSC) said this week that it will conduct two public statement hearings on Sept. 24 to seek the public’s views on an application by Niagara Mohawk Power Corp. to construct a natural gas transmission line in the towns of Rotterdam and Glenville in Schenectady County and the Town of Charlton in Saratoga County.

Responding to comments from last week’s bankruptcy hearings, Pacific Gas and Electric Co. on Wednesday filed second revisions to its disclosure statement and reorganization plan, which are under increased pressure now that California has been allowed to offer its competing plan to the federal bankruptcy court in San Francisco.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in last meeting of the year last week asked for comments on whether it should require approximately 1,200 power marketers to file financial reports on their derivative and hedging positions.

Countering comments from labor unions supporting the coal industry, the heads of three natural gas associations in Washington Thursday advised Sen. James M. Jeffords, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, that natural gas is not claiming an undue share of the power generation market. Further, natural gas reserves are plentiful and the delivery system is adequate.

Results aren’t going to be as pretty as had been expected this fiscal year, ending Oct. 31, North Carolina’s Piedmont Natural Gas said, but customers are coming back as gas prices go down, and the distributor is looking for better times ahead.

Results aren’t going to be as pretty as had been expected this fiscal year, ending Oct. 31, North Carolina’s Piedmont Natural Gas said, but customers are coming back as gas prices go down, and the distributor is looking for better times ahead.

“California’s energy crisis was voluntary. They didn’t have to do it. It didn’t have to be this way,” according to veteran energy analyst and consultant Ben Schlesinger, who told NGI this week that the state bet on the weather and the spot market, but failed to hedge its bets.

The president of the California Public Utilities Commission Wednesday gave a qualified thumbs up to the recently imposed federal wholesale electricity price mitigation measures, saying they are having an impact in “tamping down” power prices, but they are not enough.