Means

As natural gas pipelines serving traditional long-line routes to market in North America have begun filing for new rate hikes in an attempt to make up for the load lost to locally delivered shale gas, fundamental market changes associated with the rate increases could affect basis differentials going forward, according to a new report from Evergreen, CO-based Bentek Energy.

California regulators last Thursday agreed to shut two natural gas-fired electric generation units along the Southern California coast as a means of facilitating the development of a new gas-fired facility inland in eastern Los Angeles County.

A bill in a Texas House committee if passed would repeal a natural gas drilling tax break that benefits the vast majority of wells in the state’s shale gas plays. The bill’s sponsor says the incentive has outlived its usefulness, but an industry advocate claims its repeal would be a gas production- and job-killer.

Drilling in natural gas liquids-weighted plays and oil shales are expected to be the focus of domestic exploration and production (E&P) companies in 2011, energy analysts with FBR Capital Markets said Monday.

Republican control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the incoming 112th Congress means the Obama administration likely will be unsuccessful in attempting again to prop up the budget with new taxes on the oil and gas industry.

Being closer to a major market area means cheaper transport, right? Marcellus Shale producers are benefiting from that self-evident axiom, but there is some question about their relative lack of gathering/processing infrastructure compared to such areas as the Gulf Coast and Midcontinent hindering them from realizing maximum value for their gas.

Independent oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens continued to voice his support for gas-friendly legislation Wednesday, telling members of the House Committee on Ways and Means that the NAT GAS Act (HR 1835), which seeks to establish a sustained market for natural gas vehicles (NGV) and rein in gas market volatility, would create 600,000 jobs and help wean the country off imported oil.

Independent oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens continued to voice his support for gas-friendly legislation Wednesday, telling members of the House Committee on Ways and Means that the NAT GAS Act (HR 1835), which seeks to establish a sustained market for natural gas vehicles (NGV) and rein in gas market volatility, would create 600,000 jobs and help wean the country off imported oil.

In California and elsewhere, the push toward carbon dioxide emission reductions means more battles between natural gas and coal over which should be the electric generation fuel to smooth increased reliance on more intermittent sources of renewable power such as wind and solar.