Disputed

FERC on Friday issued favorable final environmental reviews for the two most hotly disputed liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects that have come before the agency in the last couple of years — the proposed 4.4 Bcf Weaver’s Cove LNG import terminal near Fall River, MA, and KeySpan LNG’s proposed conversion of its existing 600,000 barrel LNG storage terminal in Providence, RI, to an import terminal. But the KeySpan LNG project fell short of the current federal safety standards, the agency said.

After winning by the barest of margins in an election that was disputed for weeks, Washington state’s new Gov. Christine Gregoire earlier this month shook up the three-member state Utilities and Transportation Commission (UTC) by appointing two new commissioners, including a new chairperson, to six-year terms. The move pushes the current UTC chairperson, Marilyn Showalter, out of the job she has held for the past four years.

House-Senate negotiators should jettison the irreconcilable issues that threaten the passage of comprehensive energy legislation this year, a major natural gas pipeline group said.

A group of natural gas producers has called on FERC to step inand settle once and for all the controversial issue of re-designingthe capacity-allocation procedures of El Paso Natural Gas so that”firm” capacity on El Paso would really come to mean firm, and thepractice of overbooking firm primary transportation capacity wouldbecome history at the pipeline’s SoCal/Topock delivery point intoCalifornia.