Necessary

New York appears more likely to lift the de facto natural gas drilling moratorium in parts of the state’s Marcellus Shale, but for a variety of reasons — not the least of which is hesitation by operators to commit capital — determining how much of an impact the prospective acreage may have on U.S. gas markets leads to more questions than answers, according to research by Goldman Sachs & Co.

After notifying shippers Tuesday that one might become necessary due to forecasts of hot Florida temperatures, Florida Gas Transmission (FGT) issued an Overage Alert Day for market-area customers Wednesday. FGT set a 20% tolerance for negative daily imbalances.

Effective Saturday (April 9) until further notice, Nicor Gas implemented pipeline caps for deliveries to its citygate. The OFO Cap Day “is necessary due to forecasted unseasonably warm weather over the weekend period resulting in reduced system demand,” the northern Illinois LDC said. It also halted Nicor Hub interruptible storage injection services until further notice but said withdrawals will continue to be accepted. See the bulletin board for further details.

Even if producers are prevented from hydraulically fracturing (fracking) wells in New York, they may not declare a force majeure and still must pay property owners to hold the leases, a district court judge has ruled.

With natural gas now front and center on President Obama’s energy agenda (see Shale Daily, March 31), his administration has called for a broad-based panel to be formed to examine potential risks associated with hydraulic fracturing (fracking).

Producers’ increasing interest in liquids-rich gas plays that has made it necessary for midstream service providers to offer natural gas liquids (NGL) capabilities is what is suggested by last week’s pairing of Energy Transfer Partners LP (ETP) and Regency Energy Partners LP in a joint venture (JV) to do just that.

Producers’ increasing interest in liquids-rich gas plays that has made it necessary for midstream service providers to offer natural gas liquids (NGL) capabilities is what is suggested by this week’s pairing of Energy Transfer Partners LP (ETP) and Regency Energy Partners LP in a joint venture (JV) to do just that.

The natural gas-directed rig count has fallen by about 100 rigs from last summer’s peak, but further reductions are necessary if the market is to be rebalanced, argue analysts at Barclays Capital in a note published Tuesday. While independent producers appear to have stepped off the gas (in favor of oil), as a group they haven’t stopped their pursuit of company-level production growth, Barclays said.

Natural gas utilities, commercial firms and state regulators have called on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to refine its proposed definitions for swap dealers and major swap participants, which — unlike commodity end-users — will be subject to mandatory clearing of swaps under the agency’s proposed reforms (see NGI, Dec. 6, 2010).