Days

Just days after Enron Corp. ended a bid to sell Portland General to Sierra Pacific Resources Corp., Scottish Power Plc apparently decided to fling in an offer for the Oregon-based power utility. The West Coast utility would be a fit geographically with Scot Power’s PacifiCorp, which is headquartered in Portland and operates in six U.S. states. Enron would have received $2 billion from Sierra Pacific, which also would have assumed $1 billion in debt. That deal was first set up in late 1999 but started to fall apart as West Coast power problems continued (see NGI, Nov. 15, 1999). Terms for a Scot Power deal were not disclosed. Portland General has about 700,000 customers and has 2,000 MW of generating capacity. Scot Power’s PacifiCorp is now paying about $1 million a day for buy-in costs that resulted when one of its generators failed in the power crisis. For the past two years, the share price of Scot Power has registered 5% United Kingdom sector underperformance.

Just days after Enron Corp. ended a bid to sell Portland General to Sierra Pacific Resources Corp. (see Daily GPI, April 27), Scottish Power Plc apparently decided to fling in an offer for the Oregon-based power utility. The West Coast utility would be fit geographically with Scot Power’s PacifiCorp, which is headquartered in Portland and operates in six U.S. states.

Destin Pipeline will shut in when the Pascagoula (MS) Gas Plant begins about four days of maintenance May 1 at 6:30 p.m. CDT. Current Destin throughput is about 650 MMcf/d, a staffer said. The pipeline will accept about one-third of normal nominations for the May 1 gas day and will resume taking nominations on May 5 once the plant is operational. The start of the plant work represents a one-day postponement from when it was originally announced last month (see Daily GPI, March 12).

California’s governor plans to keep stirring the pot in the waning days of April, but he is realistic enough to know the pace of his energy initiatives won’t run any faster than the political wheels that turn in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. While he waits for state and federal legislative help, Gov. Gray Davis will focus on new generation this week, naming a “generation czar” to replace a loaned utility executive and continuing to try to mend political fences, according to his press spokesman.

Days after receiving preliminary authorization from FERC for a $134 million, 24-mile Boston extension project (see NGI, April 16), Maritimes & Northeast is petitioning FERC for authorization to operate additional compression units at its existing compressor stations in Richmond and Baileyville, ME. The new compression will bring the pipeline’s capacity to 440,000 Dth/d from the current 400,000 Dth/d.

Citing “excessive banking [of gas] over the last several days,” Kern River said Tuesday it is currently operating with high linepack that would negatively impact maintenance set for April 24-25. “It is imperative that operators take delivery of quantities that are scheduled immediately,” the pipeline said, adding that it will take corrective action if banking continues to be a problem. The maintenance, involving turbine inspections at the Muddy Creek and Fillmore Stations and valve replacement at the Opal Plant, was postponed from an original March schedule (see Daily GPI, March 9).

Days after receiving preliminary authorization from FERC for a $134 million, 24-mile Boston extension project (see Daily GPI, April 16), Maritimes & Northeast is petitioning FERC for authorization to operate additional compression units at its existing compressor stations in Richmond and Baileyville, ME. The new compression will bring the pipeline’s capacity to 440,000 Dth/d from the current 400,000 Dth/d.

CIG said the Strained Operating Condition it had declared for the gas days of Wednesday and Thursday, which was caused by power outages related to blizzard conditions, was lifted Thursday.

Ending its streak of up-days at four, natural gas futures sunk lower Friday, as lagging cash market prices prompted traders to take profits ahead of the weekend. After stalling at $5.48 for the second day in a row, the May contract spiraled lower to close at $5.388, a 3.4-cent loss for the day.