Higher

California’s natural gas power generation bill may be higher than normal in the first months of 2013 as the 2,200 MW San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station was shuttered. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Chair Allison Macfarland this week was at the plant for an update but hasn’t indicated when at least one of the two units would restart. Majority owner/operator Southern California Edison Co. has asked the NRC to allow at least Unit 2 to come back to 70% of capacity.

U.S. oil and gas merger and acquisition (M&A) activity will be stronger this year as companies attempt to position themselves for higher prices and increased demand, according to a nationwide survey of CFOs at 100 exploration and production companies.

Global upstream oil and natural gas deals in 2012 jumped 50% higher year/year to a record $254 billion in 679 mergers and acquisitions (M&A), according to data compiled by PLS Inc. and Derrick Petroleum Services.

Encana Corp. on Thursday struck a C$2.18 billion joint venture (JV) agreement to explore and develop close to half a million acres of its leasehold in the Duvernay Shale with a subsidiary of PetroChina International Ltd.

Since last year, gas supplies are higher, prices are lower, the forward curve is friendlier to buyers, but winter is still a wild card, FERC staff told the Commission last Thursday during the Winter 2012-2013 Energy Market Assessment presentation.

Since last year, gas supplies are higher, prices are lower, the forward curve is friendlier to buyers, but winter is still a wild card, FERC staff told the Commission Thursday during the Winter 2012-2013 Energy Market Assessment presentation.

New wells in the nation’s shale plays helped push natural gas production higher in Texas and some other states in August, but it wasn’t enough to keep the U.S. total from sliding to 76.60 Bcf/d, a 3.4% decline compared with 79.33 Bcf/d in July, according to the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) latest Monthly Natural Gas Gross Production report.

As a hedge against higher natural gas prices, a subsidiary of LSB Industries Inc., an Oklahoma-based chemical and equipment manufacturer, has bought an interest in a package of wells and potential drilling locations in Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale.

Total gross withdrawals of domestic natural gas jumped to 28.58 Tcf in 2011, a 6.5% increase from 26.84 Tcf in 2010, and are on pace to easily surpass those numbers again this year, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Monthly Energy Review for September.