Dream

Low prices have made dry gas from shales a producers’ problem and an end-user’s dream. But interests at both ends of the market do agree that the right gas price — the equilibrium price — would make shale gas a boon for the country.

Low gas prices, shrunken basis differentials, modest price volatility and abundant supply should make for an end-user’s dream, and they do. But North America’s gas renaissance comes with some wrinkles.

Liquefaction and export of domestic U.S. gas is no longer a pipe dream but an eventual certainty given the abundance of supplies from shales and thirst for gas in other parts of the world, particularly in Asian markets, said speakers at Deloitte’s annual Oil & Gas Conference in Houston Thursday. True, there are export naysayers; a recent Deloitte study commissioned by BG Group addresses at least some of their concerns.

Liquefaction and export of domestic U.S. gas is no longer a pipe dream but an eventual certainty given the abundance of supplies from shales and thirst for gas in other parts of the world, particularly in Asian markets, said speakers at Deloitte’s annual Oil & Gas Conference in Houston Thursday. True, there are export naysayers; a recent Deloitte study commissioned by BG Group addresses at least some of their concerns.

The planned first Canadian liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal will be a gateway to a growth dream by the standards of shaky North American markets and prices, Canada’s National Energy Board (NEB) is being told.

The planned first Canadian liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal will be a gateway to a growth dream by the standards of shaky North American markets and prices, Canada’s National Energy Board (NEB) is being told.

Forming what one pro-environmental group called a “green dream team,” President-elect Barack Obama has settled on Nobel Prize-winning physicist Steven Chu, who runs the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory at the University of California, to be secretary of the Department of Energy (DOE) in his administration, and has selected experienced regulators to oversee three other offices dealing with energy, environmental and climate-change issues, Washington sources said. No formal announcement, however, had been issued last week.

After years of living the American dream, the past six years have been an “American nightmare,” Enron Corp. founder Kenneth L. Lay said Monday in his fraud and conspiracy trial. Lay, 64, who faces several years in prison if he is convicted on a half dozen criminal counts, took the stand in his defense for the first time, attempting to convince jurors in Houston he had done no wrong in the months before Enron collapsed.

In its debut as Nymex prompt month, the July natural gas futures contract was a bull’s dream Friday as it surged higher to nearly erase losses suffered in sympathy with Thursday’s expiration-day June contract liquidation. A combination of speculative short-covering and end-user buying were cited as factors in the rally that propelled July up 15.8 cents to $6.370 Friday, two ticks shy of Wednesday’s $6.372 close. On Thursday, the June contract tumbled 19.2 cents to go off the board at $6.123.