Hours

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) stripped all of the tax extenders — energy and otherwise — from a pending jobs package only hours after Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) and Ranking Member Charles Grassley (R-IA) unveiled a bipartisan bill Thursday.

In less than 24 hours EXCO Resources Inc. announced two transactions worth close to $700 million to sell some natural gas-weighted properties in Oklahoma, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

House Republicans protested Tuesday when they were forced to begin debate on the Democrats’ broad energy bill only hours after getting their first glance at the 290-page measure. An up-or-down vote was expected late Tuesday on the measure that would lift the 26-year-old congressional moratorium on oil and natural gas drilling beyond 100 miles from coastlines.

September futures going higher in after-hours activity after posting a regular session gain of 17.5 cents Thursday did not have the cash market-boosting impact that one source had expected. Instead, prices fell at virtually all points Friday due to cooling load being subpar for late August in several areas, traders discounting the possibility of Tropical Storm Fay causing any substantive shut-ins, and the decline of industrial load that accompanies a weekend.

Electronic energy and agricultural trading platform IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) was off-line last Thursday — as was its website — for approximately three hours following an “emergency power outage,” according to the Atlanta-based commodity exchange.

Electronic energy and agricultural trading platform IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) was off-line Thursday — as was its website — for approximately three hours following an “emergency power outage,” according to the Atlanta-based commodity exchange.

Another chapter in California’s growing attempts to harness its abundance of solar energy was written in the wee hours Wednesday morning when the state legislature passed a statewide incentive program for solar water heating (AB 1470). The measure will now go to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is expected to sign it, according to the environmental group that helped craft the bill. The final Assembly vote was 43-29.

Citing a pipeline leak, Gulf South said Wednesday it will begin an estimated 12 hours of unscheduled maintenance on its Index 129 segment at Mile Post 44 south of the Edna Compressor Station effective with the start of Thursday’s gas day. Five points south of Edna will be required to shut in during this work. “To the extent firm service is interrupted, Gulf South will be claiming force majeure for as long as service cannot be performed due to the maintenance activity,” the pipeline said.

Less than 24 hours after President Bush outlined his energy plans as part of his State of the Union address, advisers to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared Wednesday that the president’s plans are “insufficient” and potentially harmful in adding to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Not surprisingly, state officials claim Schwarzenegger’s approach is preferable because it relies on markets and reduces GHG.