Inquiry

FERC commissioners Wednesday endorsed an inquiry into a staff proposal that calls for the Commission to convert full requirements (FR) service on the El Paso Natural Gas system to contract demand (CD) service, a move that potentially could resolve a long-simmering dispute over capacity allocation on the pipeline.

Responding to an inquiry made by Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-CA) two days after Enron Corp. filed for bankruptcy on Dec. 2, Vice President Dick Cheney’s counsel admitted in a letter released this week that Enron executives met in person six times with White House officials or the National Energy Policy Development Group Task Force last year to discuss “energy policy matters.” The first meeting was Feb. 22, 2001, about one month after President Bush took office; the last meeting was Oct. 10, 2001, one week before Enron released its third quarter earnings.

The American Gas Association (AGA) said it is undertaking a review of the procedures for performing revisions to its storage data, following an inquiry by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) about the second largest revision ever to its storage data on Aug. 22. The +47 Bcf net revision prompted a sharp drop in futures prices and an angry response from natural gas traders and marketers, who use the information to help determine available supply and to project price changes.

Prodded by Gov. George H. Ryan, the Illinois Commerce Commission(ICC) yesterday voted unanimously to open a Notice of Inquiry (NOI)to investigate the high natural gas prices in the state.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has scheduled on itsmeeting agenda for next week a policy statement initiative aimed attaking a realistic assessment of the future demand outlook fornatural gas in the eastern half of the United States.

Kansas, a significant natural gas producing state, is stickingits toes in the water of retail gas competition with a notice ofinquiry (NOI) from the Kansas Corporation Commission (KCC), “thegoal of which is to explore whether extending restructuring to allretail consumers is in the public interest. We also wish to exploreother regulatory alternatives which may bring benefits to smallerretail gas consumers.”

Producing state Kansas is sticking its toes in the water ofretail gas competition with a notice of inquiry (NOI) from theKansas Corporation Commission (KCC), “the goal of which is toexplore whether extending restructuring to all retail consumers isin the public interest. We also wish to explore other regulatoryalternatives which may bring benefits to smaller retail gasconsumers.”

The first of a series of industry meetings aimed at addressingthe controversial issues in the mega-notice of proposed rulemaking(NOPR) and notice of inquiry (NOI) gets underway in Houston today.Many are hoping the sessions will provide the way for the bickeringsegments of the gas industry to achieve common ground on some ofthe top issues posed by FERC.

The gas industry may feel swamped with all the notices ofproposed rulemaking and notices of inquiry that have been comingout of FERC within the last couple of months, but these arenecessary to accomplish restructuring in a comprehensive fashion,said James J. Hoecker.