Expire

Southern California Gas kept a high-linepack OFO that was declared for Saturday in place through Sunday, then allowed it to expire Monday.

With the initial 30-day negotiating period set to expire, CME Group Inc., owner of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and Nymex Holdings Inc., owner of the New York Mercantile Exchange, on Tuesday have agreed to extend talks regarding CME’s potential acquisition of Nymex until March 15, they said Tuesday.

Pacific Gas & Electric narrowed a systemwide high-inventory OFO issued for Saturday to a customer-specific one Sunday, then allowed it to expire Monday. However, PG&E issued a new systemwide Stage 2 high-inventory OFO for Tuesday, setting penalties of $1/Dth for exceeding a 5% tolerance on positive daily imbalances.

One day after allowing a systemwide Stage 2 high-inventory OFO to expire, Pacific Gas & Electric issued a new one for its California Gas Transmission system that takes effect Wednesday. Like the previous one, the new OFO carries penalties of $1/Dth for exceeding a 5% tolerance on positive daily imbalances.

May natural gas futures pushed 9.1 cents higher Wednesday to close at $7.689 as traders watched May options expire and awaited fresh storage news from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) Thursday morning. The June contract, which will take over prompt-month status in Globex electronic trading Thursday afternoon, closed 7.3 cents higher Wednesday at $7.781.

Florida Gas Transmission allowed an Overage Alert Day for market-area customers to expire Tuesday, but cautioned them that with freezing weather being forecasted in northern Florida again by Thursday evening, it may need to reimplement an Overage Alert Day for an upcoming gas day.

Pacific Gas & Electric did not extend a systemwide Stage 3 high-inventory OFO beyond Tuesday.

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Wednesday approved the proposed Pipeline Safety Improvement Act of 2006, reauthorizing the current pipeline safety law which was set to expire this year. The bill was introduced by committee Chairman Don Young, R-AK and Rep. Thomas Petri, R-WI. The American Gas Association said it was pleased the bill included a focus on prevention of excavation damage to pipelines, the single largest cause of incidents on the natural gas distribution system. The bill encourages stronger state damage prevention programs through financial incentives and increases penalties for failing to use the one-call system or failure to mark pipelines. The Senate still must act on the bill.

Although there was no public announcement, the Long Beach, CA Port’s Board of Harbor Commissioners in closed session June 5 decided to let expire an ongoing exclusive rights agreement with the proposed developer of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in the harbor. The five-member board said it would await the final environmental impact report (EIR) on the project before taking any further action.