Modification

County officials ran out of time last Monday to hear from all the citizens who wanted to say something about NorthernStar Natural Gas’ proposed Bradwood Landing liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal along the Columbia River in Oregon, so the public hearing will be continued on Nov. 19. Clatsop County Commissioners are weighing whether to grant NorthernStar zoning changes for the project.

FERC put an end to one of the most tortuous cases in its history Thursday, approving with one modification a $1.7 billion settlement of California’s allegations that an El Paso Corp. pipeline drove up natural gas prices in the state by withholding capacity during the state’s energy crisis, and that it gave preferential treatment to its power merchant affiliate during bidding on transportation capacity.

Guardian Pipeline has received FERC authorization last Wednesday for modification of its planned 142-mile, 750 MMcf/d mainline from Chicago north to allow an interconnection with the system of ANR Pipeline. The original plan had been for Guardian to connect with Alliance Pipeline.

Southern California Edison called on FERC last week to approve”without condition or modification” an agreement under which ElPaso Natural Gas would pay the California electric utility $32million and make other concessions to forestall the collapse of its1996 capacity-turnback settlement. The deal, if approved by FERC,would put an end to a four-year legal battle by Edison, the only ElPaso customer to object to the settlement in its entirety. It also”clears the way” for Commission approval of the settlement.

April 26-30 turbine modification at Transwestern’s BloomfieldStation on the San Juan Lateral will cut 25,000 MMBtu/d of Ignacio(CO) to Blanco (NM) capacity.

The Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA) saidmember companies plan to complete their Year 2000 (Y2K) computeranalysis, modification and testing by October and will havecontingencies in place should the new millennium bring problems.