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Some sources figured the screen’s steep drop Friday afternoonwould have a depressing effect on cash numbers Monday, but theyreckoned without the heat that began blanketing the U.S. east ofthe Mississippi River over the weekend and continued through earlythis week.

By agreeing last week to sell the stock of its retail marketingarm to Enron Energy Services Operations Inc. for $85 million,PG&E National Energy Group not only trimmed non-profitableassets from its portfolio, but perpetuated an industry-wide trendof major companies exiting the retail arena.

The right price signals and eventual resulting technologicaladvances are going to be needed to stimulate the number of naturalgas-fired merchant power plants needed over the next 10 years tosatisfy the projected growth in energy requirements, according to aReliant Energy executive. However, actions on both coasts(California and New York) have cast doubts on whether sufficientincentives will fully develop.

Cash numbers remained in their early-March climbing modeThursday, with advances of about a nickel to more than a dimeclosely mirroring those of the day before. However, a majordifference on Thursday was that western upticks tended to besmallest. The larger increases were mostly in eastern markets.

GE Power Systems has not been able to keep its gas and steamturbines on the shelves, as Reliant Energy, Duke Energy NorthAmerica and NRG Energy all recently signed long-term multi-turbineagreements.

It wasn’t difficult to understand why spot prices were going upsharply again Monday when one considers that several new pipelineOFOs related to colder weather joined ongoing OFOs or other systemconstraints (see Transportation Notes). Freezing conditions weresettling into much of the nation’s midsection Monday, with winterstorms expected to penetrate even the Deep South by today. Thepredictable result of such a frigid onslaught was heavy heatingdemand for gas that sent prices higher by about a dime or more onmost pipes. Some points, such as Chicago and Northeast citygatesalong with Upper Midwest deliveries by Northern Natural Gas (demarcand Ventura), achieved gains in excess of 20 cents.

Entergy Corp., a major New Orleans-based power producer andutility company, will keep its wallet open for the foreseeablefuture as it unveiled a five-year $9.8 billion capital investmentplan yesterday. The company said it will use the cash influx tofuel growth in power development and nuclear operations businesses,while also improving the performance of its utility operations.

A big fish gobbled up yet another small fish in the Northeastyesterday as Southern Union Co. (SU), the spurned suitor ofSouthwest Gas, announced it has agreed to purchase ProvidenceEnergy (ProvEnergy) for a total transaction value of $400 million.The deal, which SU expects to close in nine to 12 months,represents SU’s third Northeast utility purchase this year. If allthese deals are completed, Southern Union will serve 1.5 millioncustomers in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Texas,Missouri and Florida.

As Atlantic Canada’s new natural gas industry prepares to beginproduction and export deliveries Nov. 1, the National Energy Board(NEB) has set out to keep it clear of legal and political feudsdisrupting the region’s fishing community.