Directed

One of the five elected members of the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) last Tuesday proposed to her fellow state regulators that ACC staff be directed to investigate the pension plan funding levels of all major utilities in the state after her assessment of the state’s three major private-sector energy utilities revealed they are all currently under-funded collectively by more than $500 million.

Power plant developer/operator Calpine Corp. Tuesday was directed by a Delaware court to work out a plan in the next week for returning more than $300 million in proceeds from oil/gas asset sales whose earlier distribution had been challenged by two sets of corporate bondholders. The monies need to be distributed back into The Bank of New York, a collateral trustee and one of the plaintiffs filing the lawsuit in the Delaware Court of Chancery.

Despite a 30% increase in gas-directed drilling in the United States over the last two years, quarterly production statistics from public financial reports show domestic production is still declining, analysts at Raymond James & Associates and UBS said this week. Both found second quarter domestic gas production down 1.2% from levels at the end of the second quarter of 2004 based on separate E&P surveys.

FERC last Wednesday announced procedures to bring more than 200 companies into compliance with Commission regulations or have them risk losing their market-based rate authority.

John W. Somerhalder II, who directed El Paso Corp.’s natural gas pipeline group before resigning earlier this year (see Daily GPI, March 31), has entered into an agreement and general release with the company. He also entered into a Professional Services Agreement to provide consulting services to El Paso on various pipeline projects for $41,000 per month for 12 months. Under the severance agreement, Somerhalder will receive $642,000. El Paso also agreed to provide Somerhalder with a prorationing of his incentive compensation for 2005, which included one third of his target 2005 annual cash incentive bonus in the amount of $203,300, a cash equivalent in the amount of $12.815 million equal to the prorated value of a 2005 equity award had he received that grant and eight months of continued medical coverage subject to his payment of the required contributions. Upon his departure, Somerhalder had 95,000 vested nonqualified stock options and 49,531 shares of vested restricted stock.

The domestic natural gas-directed rig count is at a two-decade high, gas well completions are at a record high, and the number of seismic crews searching for gas onshore has increased, but the production of dry gas in the United States has remained essentially flat at 50 Bcf/d since early 2002, an official with the Natural Gas Supply Association (NGSA) said last Monday.

The domestic natural gas-directed rig count is at a two-decade high, gas well completions are at a record high, and the number of seismic crews searching for gas onshore has increased, but the production of dry gas in the United States has remained essentially flat at 50 Bcf/d since early 2002, an official with the Natural Gas Supply Association (NGSA) said Monday.

Calgary-based Esprit Exploration — known until a year ago as Canadian 88 Energy Corp. — is remaking itself once again after the board unanimously approved a proposal to reorganize into a new energy trust that would own approximately 90% of the company’s existing producing assets.

Federal energy regulators last Wednesday directed over 100 control area operators and transmission providers to report back to the Commission on training practices through a survey. FERC said that by understanding these practices better, the overall reliability of the grid can be improved.