Gulf

Energy trading house Freepoint Commodities LLC and two private equity (PE) partners on Monday agreed to provide $110 million to Whistler Energy II LLC to buy two producing blocks in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico (GOM).

The National Hurricane Center (NHC) was reporting Friday afternoon that an area of low pressure off the Yucatan Peninsula in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico could threaten Gulf of Mexico (GOM) energy interests. Several companies had reported that they had begun evacuations of nonessential personnel.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) has issued air permits to Chevron Phillips Chemical Co. (CPChem) LP, moving plans for a 3.3 billion pounds/year ethane cracker and two new polyethylene facilities on Texas’ Gulf Coast one step closer to reality, the company said.

In a notice published in theFederal RegisterWednesday, the Transportation Department’s Maritime Administration (MARAD) announced its final authorization of the decommissioning of the Gulf Gateway Energy Bridge Deepwater Port, the first deepwater liquefied natural gas (LNG) import facility of its kind in the world. The Excelerate Energy LP facility is being retired just eight years after it went into service in the Gulf of Mexico.

The elephant named Marcellus that has been sitting on Northeast-Henry Hub basis isn’t about to move along, and what used to be a premium market will see trades discounted to the U.S. gas benchmark for a while, analysts at Credit Suisse said in a note Tuesday.

In a nation where citizens’ national identity is tied to the state-owned oil and natural gas industry, and past high-profile efforts to inject more global private-sector investment have withered, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto on Monday proposed opening the nation to more shared private-sector energy investment.

The natural gas cash market added 2 cents on average overall Tuesday for Wednesday delivery with small gains and small losses at most points characterizing the day’s trading. Midwest points were mixed as weather outlooks held to seasonal norms, and Gulf points were a few pennies higher. At the close of lackluster futures trading September had drifted lower by 0.1 cent to $3.318 and October had eased 0.3 cent to $3.343. September crude oil dropped $1.26 to $105.30/bbl.

Williams on Thursday said it has restricted some natural gas pipeline services on its mainstay Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line LLC (aka Transco) because of capacity constraints in the Pennsylvania portion of the Marcellus Shale.

The revival of the U.S. industrial sector will be “the most significant driver” to higher long-term natural gas prices, lifted by new ethylene crackers, ammonia plants and natural gas-to-liquids (GTL) facilities fed by unconventional natural gas, according to an analysis by Raymond James & Associates Inc.