Evening

The Texas Senate Wednesday evening unanimously passed legislation to require disclosure of the contents of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) fluid, “breaking ground that no other state has done,” according to state Sen. Troy Fraser (R-Horseshoe Bay). However, a floor amendment could thwart the bill’s progress.

Judging from testimony at a Texas House Energy Resources Committee hearing Wednesday evening, numerous producing and midstream interests in the state want to keep the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC) much the same as it is instead of replacing the three-member body with a new one-commissioner entity, as has been approved by the Senate in SB 655 (see Daily GPI, April 14; April 6).

With almost half of the write-in ballots counted Thursday evening, Incumbent U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-AK, was capturing nearly 90% of the tally or 40,500 in unchallenged votes. The count was to continue through the weekend.

With almost half of the write-in ballots counted Thursday evening, incumbent U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-AK, was capturing nearly 90% of the tally or 40,500 in unchallenged votes for Alaska senator. The count was to continue through the weekend.

The House was poised to vote out possibly as early as Wednesday evening legislation calling for sweeping financial regulatory reforms, including regulation and transparency of the over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives market for the first time. Passage of the bill in the Senate, however, wasn’t expected to be as easy.

Pacific Gas and Electric did not issue a systemwide Stage 2 high-inventory OFO for Wednesday on its California Gas Transmission system until Tuesday evening. It extended the OFO through at least Thursday and tightened the tolerance for positive daily imbalances from 13% to 5%.

Tennessee declared a force majeure Tuesday evening for the 527A-1300 and 527A-1800 lines as a result of damage from Hurricane Ike. The 527A-1300 Line is a 15-mile, 12-inch diameter lateral originating at South Pass 49A offshore southeast Louisiana and terminating with a connection to the Tennessee-owned South Pass 55 platform. The 527A-1800 Line is an 8-inch diameter lateral about 0.1 mile long originating at South Pass 52 and terminating with a connection to the 527A-1300 Line. The South Pass 49 A and South Pass 52 meters were required to shut in until further notice.

Southern California Gas declared a high-linepack OFO for the Evening nominations cycle of Friday’s gas day, saying it will assess Buy-Back charges in accordance with its rules and tariffs to customers who deliver into its system more than 110% of their actual gas usage on the OFO day.

Transwestern said it would complete resolution of a force majeure event at Compressor Station 2 near Flagstaff, AZ (see Daily GPI, March 18) by Thursday evening and was accepting Timely cycle nominations for Friday’s gas day on its Thoreau/West system up to the normal capacity of 1,220,000 MMBtu/d.