Mega

Foothills Pipe Lines Ltd. has recruited an early ally for itseffort to revive the dormant Alaska Natural Gas TransportationSystem — the government of Canada’s Yukon Territory.

Plans for the pipeline were announced last December (see NGI, Dec.27, 1999). Project completion is scheduled for third quarter 2001.

Trans-Union Pipeline L.P., a subsidiary of Panda Energy Intl.,said yesterday it has contracted Willbros Group, Inc. to build oneof the largest single-project pipelines in North America. Willbroswas hired to engineer and construct a 42-mile, 30-inch natural gaspipeline to supply at least 430,000 Dth/d of gas to a planned 2,700MW gas-fired facility in southern Arkansas. Willbros estimated thevalue of the construction contract at $30 million.

Reliant Energy Gas Transmission, whose proposal to supplytransportation services to a mega gas-fired generation project wasspurned, is now rapping that very same power project, insistingthat there’s not enough demand to justify the project or thepipeline option that was selected to supply it with natural gas.

Reliant Energy Gas Transmission, whose proposal to supplytransportation services to a mega gas-fired generation project wasrejected, is now rapping that very same power project, insistingthat there’s not enough demand to justify the project or thepipeline option that was selected to supply it with natural gas.

FERC last week accepted the $34.5 million mega-negotiatedcontract between Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America (NGPL) andAquila Energy Marketing Corp., but there was a glitch. TheCommission’s acceptance was conditioned on the Midwest pipelineproviding a “satisfactory explanation” of why the transactiondoesn’t conflict with capacity-release rules and regulations, whichFERC suspects is the case.

FERC yesterday accepted the $34.5 million mega-negotiatedcontract between Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America (NGPL) andAquila Energy Marketing Corp., but there was a glitch. TheCommission’s acceptance was conditioned on the Midwest pipelineproviding a “satisfactory explanation” of why the transactiondoesn’t conflict with capacity-release rules and regulations, whichFERC suspects is the case.

In a move creating an entity that will challenge CMS Energy Corp. for the title of Michigan’s largest gas and electric utility, DTE Energy Co. announced the purchase of MCN Energy Group last week in a cash and stock transaction valued at $2.6 billion. The combined company will be headquartered in Detroit and named DTE Energy Co. The merger is expected to be one of the speediest among utilities, closing in six to nine months.

Continuing its pile-up of large energy management deals, Enron Energy Services (EES) announced a 10-year, $1 billion energy outsourcing agreement with Owens Corning last week. Enron’s services will cover 20 of the glass and composite material manufacturer’s major facilities located throughout the United States. Management services began when the contract was announced.