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While Sabine Pipe Line continues to lift its force majeure on a few more Henry Hub interconnects each day, Cambridge Energy Research Associates’ (CERA) Kenneth Yeasting, director of Eastern North American Energy, wonders if too much emphasis has been placed on the Erath, LA, pipeline hub as the benchmark pricing point for North American natural gas market.

Terra Industries Inc. a leading world producer of nitrogen products, has lowered the utilization of each of its North American plants by 10% in response to the run-up in natural gas prices following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, said company President Michael Bennett Monday.

The cash market finally made it unanimous. Following four days in which a few points had run counter to the prevailing trend up or down each day, all prices were moving in the same direction Friday — way down. The major softening had been predictable in light of the screen’s dive of nearly 81 cents Thursday and forecasts of moderate to cool temperatures in most areas for the weekend.

TEPPCO has scheduled maintenance at its Falcon Station in the Jonah Gathering Field for Wednesday and again Sept. 21, according to a Kern River posting. Each day’s work will curtail an estimated 325 MMcf/d. “Because most of the gas comes to Kern River either through the Opal or the Pioneer receipt points, there will be an impact to Kern shippers,” the pipeline said.

While there had been a few exceptions to overall price movement up or down on each day earlier in the week, all points were on the same page Friday in recording losses ranging from a little less than 20 cents to half a dollar.

With each new negative vote from a little coastal town in Maine it becomes less likely that the state will be the home of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal. While that certainly is not good news for gas consumers in the state, including the 1,500 MW of gas-fired power generation, state officials believe there will be enough gas coming south from two LNG import terminals in Canada to serve gas demand growth.

With each new negative vote from a little coastal town in Maine it becomes less likely that the state will be the home of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal. While that certainly is not good news for gas consumers in the state, including the 1,500 MW of gas-fired power generation, state officials believe there will be enough gas coming south from two LNG import terminals in Canada.

Transco plans smart pig operations on 62 miles of Main Line A from Station 35 north of Houston to Station 40 in Hardin County, TX. Each pig run will take place across two gas days but on one calendar day, the pipeline said. The calendar dates for the project are March 9 and 16. In order to ensure that the pig runs provide accurate information, during the gas days of March 8-9 and March 15-16 Transco will not allow any IT or secondary firm service for gas received upstream and intended for delivery downstream of Station 35 and/or Station 40. For the same periods, due-pipeline imbalance quantities scheduled for receipt upstream of Stations 35 and 40 will not be allowed. Also, on the gas days of March 8 and March 15, FT receipts for delivery downstream of Stations 35 and/or 40 will be limited to 350,000 Dth/d. FT deliveries downstream of Station 40 will be kept whole if requested, Transco said.

Each week dozens of prognosticators toss out their predictions of the weekly gas storage change, the most significant piece of supply and demand information available in the gas market today. But it’s surprising to know that on average the predictions of 34 top firms, including five energy companies, 28 financial houses and one energy consulting firm, have been off by about 13.2 Bcf/week since the Energy Information Administration (EIA) took over the survey from the American Gas Association in May 2002.