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South Jersey Gas Co. filed a petition with New Jersey’s Board ofPublic Utilities (BPU) to increase eligibility in its customerchoice pilot program from 25,000 to 50,000. The announcement marksthe second time in the past 12 months the utility has increased thesize of its pilot. The BPU has set Dec. 31 as a deadline to definecomplete statewide gas deregulation. South Jersey said 22,000customers have participated in the program. The utility serves260,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers in thestate.

Senate and House lawmakers are expected to vote this week on a$15-billion emergency funding measure that, among other things,would provide some long-sought relief to natural gas and oilproducers.

While reporting increased earnings overall for both its utilityand unregulated businesses, PG&E Corp.’s first quarter resultsreleased yesterday (May 17) continue to show red ink for its Texasnatural gas operations, trading and energy services businesses.Results were net earnings of 42 cents-per-share, or 37 cents fullydiluted, compared to 36 cents-per-share for the first quarter of1998. Overall, the utility contributed all but three cents to theearnings, compared to 1998 first quarter when it provided 100percent of the earnings.

Pioneer Natural Resources, a Dallas-based independent producer,announced an agreement Monday to sell $245 million worth of oil andgas fields to Prize Energy Co., a Tulsa, OK-based producer. Lastmonth, Pioneer had planned to sell most of these same properties toCostilla Energy, but Costilla was unable to close the deal. ThePrize acquisition is expected to close June 29 with an effectivedate of July 1.

The cash market began the week by posting small advances Mondayon top of what was considered abnormally strong Friday pricing fora lower-demand weekend. The new increases were small, though,rarely getting above 4 cents, and some points registered as flat.

Much like Charismatic, winner of the Preakness and the KentuckyDerby,the futures market was off to the races Monday. Afteropening slightly more than a penny below Friday’s settlement price,the futures market spiked dramatically higher in the first hour oftrading as local buying pushed the market through last week’s$2.315 high. June continued higher yesterday afternoon, finishingup 5.5 cents to $2.343.

Shell Oil affiliate Tejas Energy agreed to sell its Transokaffiliate to Enogex Inc. for about $700 million, which includesEnogex’s assumption of $173 million of long-term debt. Transok isheadquartered in Tulsa and operates more than 5,000 miles ofpipelines with capacity of about 2.5 Bcf/d and nine gas processingand treating plants.

Defying the conventional wisdom that lower gas demand over aweekend usually causes softer prices, cash prices put on a show ofstrength Friday with nearly all points rising by a nickel or more.An increase of less than a penny in the Henry Hub futures contractprovided little support for the cash market, so sources concludedit must have been the residual effect from Thursday’s screen run-upof nearly a dime that helped push up cash quotes Friday.

After a hectic trading week that saw the June contract tradewithin a choppy, 15-cent range, traders tiptoed through Friday’snatural gas session. A late rally and retreat right before theclose of trading was the only real excitement in an otherwisefeatureless trading landscape. The June contract finished at$2.288, up 0.6 cents for the day and 1.5 cents for the week.