Interested

Interested parties may submit bids through Wednesday for taking temporary assignment of up to 53,000 gigajoules/day of firm M12 capacity held by TransCanada PipeLines on the Union Gas Ltd. system in Ontario. The space, which will be available from Nov. 1 until March 31, 2002, is from the Dawn receipt point to the Parkway delivery point. Minimum bid price is the current Union posted rate of C$2.584/GJ/month, TransCanada said. Parties awarded capacity are responsible for Union’s posted commodity and fuel charges. See the TransCanada bulletin board for other details or call Kay Coad at (403) 920-5569.

Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. began an open season on its new Northeast ConneXion Project Monday, which would expand both its storage and pipeline capacity for its northeast markets. The storage expansion of up to 5 Bcf could provide as much as 300,000 Dth/d of incremental deliverability and will serve as the base load for the pipeline expansion. The non-binding open season ends May 31.

The Woodlands, TX-based Mitchell Energy & Development Corp. is attracting interest from potential buyers, according to founder and CEO George Mitchell, 81. Mitchell, speaking to reporters following the company’s annual meeting Wednesday, would not confirm nor deny that the company is considering offers. “We’ll see what happens,” he said.

The Woodlands, TX-based Mitchell Energy & Development Corp. is attracting interest from potential buyers, according to founder and CEO George Mitchell, 81. Mitchell, speaking to reporters following the company’s annual meeting Wednesday, would not confirm nor deny that the company is considering offers. “We’ll see what happens,” he said.

Trailblazer Pipeline is holding an open season to see ifshippers are interested in a pipeline expansion or an extensionproject that would provide greatly expanded market access forPowder River Basin producers.

FERC commissioners last week finalized revisions to rules foroff-the-record communications between commissioners and key staffand persons outside the Commission. Chairman James Hoecker said thenew rule (Order No. 607) provides a balance that “will supply theclarity and precision we need. They should facilitate better accessto information while ensuring the integrity of our processes.”

Columbia Energy Group subsidiary Columbia Energy Services (CES)yesterday said it would sell its Houston-based wholesale andtrading operations. The move follows a review of CES’ overallenergy marketing businesses begun in February after the unitreported a $59 million operating loss for 1998.

For those interested in the ratings game, this past week was nota good one for natural gas companies as Moody’s Investors Servicedowngraded one natural gas company and Standard & Poor’s puttwo others on CreditWatch with negative implications. All threeremain in the rarefied upper ranks by virtue of the guaranteedreturns that come with their utility operations. But it’s theirincreasing unregulated business that’s making the ratings agenciesnervous.