Exceed

El Paso Corp. posted a tepid first quarter profit on Tuesday, stung by weak natural gas production and hedging losses. However, the Houston-based company reversed its losses from a year ago, lifted by strong natural gas pipeline and field service earnings.

El Paso Corp. posted a tepid first quarter profit on Tuesday, stung by weak natural gas production and hedging losses. However, the Houston-based company reversed its losses from a year ago, lifted by strong natural gas pipeline and field service earnings.

XTO Energy Inc. said Wednesday it now expects to exceed last year’s natural gas and oil production by 24-26%, after reporting record output in the first quarter.

Natural gas supply and demand will exceed 30 Tcf by 2020 if policy makers swiftly enact measures that are favorable to liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports, construction of an Alaskan gas pipeline and open up U.S. lands that currently are off limits to producers, according to a new report released by the American Gas Foundation (AGF) Monday.

Projecting that its linepack would exceed maximum target levels in the next few days, Pacific Gas & Electric issued a customer-specific OFO for Friday.

Cash prices cratered Friday with quite a few points taking dives of more than a dollar. The entire market — pressured by forecasts of widespread mild to cool weather that was entirely appropriate for early autumn, bountiful storage inventories and the normal slump of industrial load associated with a weekend — fell by around 55 cents or more, except for a couple of Gulf Coast pipes whose losses were limited to a little more than 30 cents.

Bids during an open season for working storage capacity in the Phase II expansion of the Hill-Lake Gas Storage field exceeded planned capacity by nearly 50%, according to developer Falcon Gas Storage Co. Inc.

The Department of Transportation ordered Northwest Friday to not exceed 80% of its Maximum Allowable Operating Pressure on the 26-inch line between Sumas and Washougal, WA. The pressure reduction is the DOT’s Office of Pipeline Safety response to a line failure that occurred Thursday afternoon between the Washington cities of Auburn and Sumner (see Daily GPI, May 5), and will continue until Northwest fulfills certain conditions. The pipeline said it had repaired the broken line and restored it to service Sunday, but began implementing the order and completed the pressure cut by Friday night, switching delivery feeds to the neighboring 30-inch line as necessary to maintain required delivery pressures. Northwest estimated it will be limited to a maximum of about 800,000 Dth/d in receipts at Sumas/SIPI until further notice and will cut alternate gas there exceeding 800,000 Dth/d, and primary gas if necessary. “Based upon customer activity over the weekend, we do not expect customers having primary firm capacity through Sumas/SIPI to be affected,” it said. Due to warmer Pacific Northwest weather and lower customer loads, no service cuts had been made as of late Monday afternoon, a spokeswoman said.

Scheduled northbound volumes through the Kemmerer (WY) Compressor Station continue to exceed 500,000 Dth/d, Northwest said, while its Jackson Prairie storage account continues to decrease. Shippers were told that the pipeline will evaluate conditions on a daily basis, and if it finds that not maximizing a receipt or delivery point will alleviate the Kemmerer constraint, “please be advised that Northwest will NOT maximize these points in the Timely cycle.” The pipeline was not allowing any balancing Thursday except onto its system in the segment north of Kemmerer.