Gear

As oil and gas exploration continues in high gear mode to erase the supply/demand imbalance, Kerr-McGee Corp. reported that it has increased its international position in high potential trends by nearly 10% so far in 2001. The Oklahoma City-based company said it has acquired interests in more than 3 million additional deepwater acres around the globe.

As oil and gas exploration continues in high gear mode to erase the supply/demand imbalance, Kerr-McGee Corp. reported that it has increased its international position in high potential trends by nearly 10% so far in 2001. The Oklahoma City-based company said it has acquired interests in more than 3 million additional deepwater acres around the globe..

With electricity price shock still very much on their minds,California’s three major investor-owned gas utilities are alreadygearing up for potential similar shock surrounding natural gasbills this winter as gas futures prices are hovering twice as highas they were a year ago. Wednesday natural gas futures hit anotherall-time high, topping $5.

With electricity price shock still very much on their minds, California’s three major investor-owned gas utilities are already gearing up for potential similar shock surrounding natural gas bills this winter as gas futures prices are hovering twice as high as they were a year ago. Wednesday natural gas futures hit another all-time high, topping $5.

As state regulators and utilities gear up for the advent ofdistributed generation, one of California’s native sons and thefirst company in the nation to market commercial distributed powergeneration systems for businesses, Capstone Turbine Corp., ispreparing for its own $115 million IPO later this spring.

As state regulators and utilities gear up for the advent ofdistributed generation, one of California’s native sons and thefirst company in the nation to market commercial distributed powergeneration systems for businesses, Capstone Turbine Corp., ispreparing for its own $115 million IPO later this spring.

Vector Pipeline management was all smiles last week asconstruction on the pipeline kicked into high gear and one of itsmain competitors, CMS Gas Transmission & Storage Co.’s TriStatePipeline, halted efforts to pursue its application forconstruction. While TriState foundered, the Vector project, whichwould make 1 Bcf/d of transport available from western Canada toChicago, is on schedule to start service in October.

“This gas market is stuck in neutral gear,” lamented a westerntrader Monday. “We’re seeing about the same prices as on Friday, soyou could almost ‘cut and paste’ those notes into today’s report.”Sure enough, except for a moderate spike at Transco Zone 6-NYC thatwas retreating in late action, Monday’s quotes maintained thepredominantly flat market that has prevailed since last Tuesday.

With the opening of expanded natural gas storage anddeliverability last week at jointly owned Jackson Prairie in thesouthwest part of Washington state, interstate pipelines likeWilliams’ Northwest and Kern River are trying to develop more andbetter services to gas-fired electric generation plants which areexpected to proliferate across the U.S. landscape in the early 21stCentury.