Deteriorated

The wall thickness of a section of pipe on the 20-inch diameter Columbia Gas Transmission system that ruptured Tuesday in West Virginia was significantly deteriorated, said National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators Thursday. There also was a pressure drop on the line, but the magnitude of the decrease is unknown as was whether drop was the result of the rupture or its cause.

Canadian natural gas exports deteriorated further during the 2009-2010 heating season, contributing to an accelerating switch of drilling targets to oil north of the border.

Canadian natural gas exports deteriorated further during the 2009-2010 heating season, contributing to an accelerating switch of drilling targets to oil north of the border.

The Williams Cos. Inc.’s consolidated credit measures have”deteriorated” due to an aggressive capital investment program,ever-widening losses from its communications business and weakenergy prices throughout 1998 and earlier this year, but Fitch IBCAnevertheless gave the company a credit rating of ‘BBB’ basedlargely on the stability of its interstate gas pipelines and thegrowth potential of its diversified energy businesses.

Thursday’s trading was almost a repeat of Wednesday as cashquotes for both late August and September deteriorated again.Another big drop on the Nymex screen was too much for the physicalgas market to ignore, and sources continued to report that sellersgreatly outnumbered buyers. In some instances a buyer could almostname his or her September price, one trader said.