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New York-based hedge fund Highbridge Capital Management, majority owned by JP Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM), reached an agreement last week to invest in Louis Dreyfus Group’s merchant energy arm to form a new trading partnership. The venture, to be called Louis Dreyfus Highbridge Energy LLC (LDH Energy), will trade both physical and financial contracts, supported by a portfolio of energy assets that include storage and transportation facilities.

New York-based hedge fund Highbridge Capital Management, majority owned by JP Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM), has reached an agreement to invest in Louis Dreyfus Group’s merchant energy arm to form a new trading partnership. The venture, to be called Louis Dreyfus Highbridge Energy LLC (LDH Energy), will trade both physical and financial contracts, supported by a portfolio of energy assets that include storage and transportation facilities.

Bowling Green, KY-based Allied Energy Group Inc. and Mammoth Energy Group Inc. announced a joint venture in which Allied will invest $1.5 million in a Rogers County, OK, coalbed methane project in exchange for a 33% working interest, leaving Mammoth’s wholly owned subsidiary, KMV Consulting Inc., with a 49.5% net revenue interest. Under terms of the agreement, the two companies also will be working jointly on a shallow natural gas project in Colorado and a large project in northeastern Montana.

Sempra Energy CEO Donald Felsinger said the company will invest $10 billion over the next five years in its utilities and natural gas infrastructure businesses and is “fairly confident” the company can fund the program internally and by selling nonstrategic assets.

Sempra Energy CEO Donald Felsinger said Wednesday the company plans to invest $10 billion over the next five years in its utilities and natural gas infrastructure businesses and is “fairly confident” the company can fund the program internally and by selling nonstrategic assets.

BP plc, with long-term greenhouse gas reduction targets in place and plans to invest $8 billion in solar, wind, hydrogen and other clean-energy technologies in the next 10 years, received top scores among 100 companies that are working to develop climate-friendly technologies, according to Ceres, a Boston-based investor coalition.

With oil and natural gas companies poised to invest up to $6 trillion in exploration and production (E&P) through 2030, the 28-year-old reserves accounting rules overseen by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) should be updated to reflect new technology advances, a year-long study by Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) has concluded.

BP is raising its stake in North American natural gas, announcing it will invest up to $2.2 billion to double production from its acreage in the Wamsutter gas field in the Rocky Mountains. The multiyear drilling program is expected to increase BP’s share of ultimate recovery from the Wyoming field by 450 MMboe and increase daily net production 125-250 MMcf/d by the end of the decade.

El Paso Corp. will pay the state of Arizona $3.4 million, invest another $43 million in capital improvement projects in the state and accelerate $30 million in already-planned pipeline integrity expenditures as part of a settlement that received final approval from the Maricopa County Superior Court on Monday. The settlement covers pending litigation against the company from the western energy crisis in 2000 and 2001.