Necessary

A blueprint for a climate change and energy bill that sponsors hope will gain the 60 votes necessary to pass the Senate in 2010 was released Thursday by the three lawmakers who have been leading the charge for legislation: Sens. John Kerry (D-MA), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT). Separately, Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Susan Collins (R-ME) on Friday unveiled a competing proposal to create a “cap and dividend” structure that would give dividends to U.S. taxpayers.

A blueprint for a climate change and energy bill that sponsors hope will gain the 60 votes necessary to pass the Senate in 2010 was released Thursday by the three lawmakers who have been leading the charge for legislation: Sens. John Kerry (D-MA), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT). Separately, Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Susan Collins (R-ME) on Friday unveiled a competing proposal to create a “cap and dividend” structure that would give dividends to U.S. taxpayers.

Backers of the proposed Oregon-based Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas (LNG) project are confident they will have all the necessary federal, state and local approvals by late 2010 to begin construction of their terminal and connecting interstate gas pipeline.

Passage of the revised $700 billion rescue plan for financial markets in the House remains the big unknown. House Majority Leader Steny Hoy (D-MD) said he will not call up the package Friday unless he is assured of passage, CQ Today reported.

ExxonMobil Corp.’s chief executive said last week that not only is increased liquefied natural gas (LNG) production still very necessary to meet the world’s insatiable gas demand, but also that his company plans to be the lead player in the movement.

ExxonMobil Corp.’s chief executive said Tuesday that not only is increased liquefied natural gas (LNG) production still very necessary to meet the world’s insatiable gas demand, but also that his company plans to be the lead player in the movement.

After cautioning customers a day earlier that an FTNN Hourly Limit OFO might become necessary because of concern about potential excess drafting of the pipeline due to frigid market-area weather (see Daily GPI, Dec. 14), Dominion followed through Friday by announcing that the OFO would become effective Sunday (Dec. 16) until further notice. Dominion also said a Conform Transportation Services to Scheduled Nominations OFO would take effect Sunday. See the bulletin board for details.

After implementing a Strained Operating Condition (SOC) Friday, CIG has issued an OFO that will take effect Wednesday until further notice. The OFO was necessary to preserve system integrity and reliability, the pipeline said. As noted in the SOC posting, “CIG’s system is operating at an extremely high load factor. Further, CIG’s total storage inventories are currently at or near the operational field limits, including the largest field, Ft. Morgan, which is nearly at operational capacity. Because of these conditions, CIG does not have the ability to absorb imbalances caused by mismatches between scheduled receipts and deliveries or those arising from variations in actual gas flow relative to scheduled quantities. As stated in the SOC, capacity for interruptible storage injections is not available.” Conditions of the OFO include a requirement that interruptible storage customers withdraw the greater of 10% of current inventory or 5,000 Dth/d. See the bulletin board for other details.

As it had warned might be necessary, Florida Gas Transmission (FGT) issued an Overage Alert Day for market-area customers Tuesday, citing forecasts for temperatures in the mid to upper 90s in Florida. The tolerance for negative daily imbalances was set at 10%. FGT said it would not interrupt previously scheduled market-area ITS-1 service for Tuesday’s gas day.