Normal

As a result of “much colder than normal temperatures forecasted for this time of the heating season” due to arrive early Sunday in its market area, NGPL issued an OFO that limited hourly takes and daily balancing at delivery points in the Market Delivery Zone effective at 6 a.m. CST Sunday until further notice. Another factor in the OFO’s implementation is “the high average hourly peak loads observed during similar weather conditions this year in January and February,” NGPL said.

ANR said that as a result of normal pigging operations from offshore Louisiana to its Patterson Compressor Station, it “has encountered an abnormally large quantity of liquids in the line,” which has shut down the station. Until the liquids issue has been resolved and Patterson is back online, ANR will not be scheduling any interruptible deliveries between Patterson and Eunice, LA until further notice.

Transco completed construction work at Station 35 and station capacity was nearly back to normal as of Friday afternoon, a spokeswoman said. The project, which was causing an allocation bottleneck at downstream Station 40, began in May and was originally scheduled to end July 1 but got delayed (see Daily GPI, July 23). There will be additional commissioning outages in coming weeks that will restrict Station 40 capacity temporarily, but most will be only one day long, the spokeswoman said.

Coming off of a year highlighted by milder than normal weather, El Paso Energy Partners LP. reported a 51% increase in 2001 pro forma cash flow, as measured by adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA), of $161.4 million compared with $107.0 million in 2000. Pro forma net income, which also excludes non-recurring items, was $61.8 million ($0.58 per unit) for 2001 — more than triple the $20.5 million (loss of $0.03 per unit) in 2000. The company’s net income was $55.1 million ($0.38 per unit) for 2001 and includes non-recurring charges of $6.7 million ($0.19 per unit) primarily related to asset sales in 2001.

The weekend is expected to give some relief to California’s “cold snap,” although by normal Midwest or Eastern standards, the daytime temperatures in the 50s and 60s are downright balmy, but by the standards of this state — even in winter — it’s been downright freezing in the nighttime and morning hours, pushing natural gas consumption to near-record levels from San Diego to the Oregon border.

Based on normal weather, natural gas customers served by St. Louis-based Laclede Gas will see a 35% reduction in their winter heating bills, the company estimates. Laclede, with an estimated 633,000 customers in St. Louis and eastern Missouri, bases its cost estimates on the recent wholesale price projections for the winter period from November through March 2002.

AGA was even more reticent than normal when asked why it made one of the largest revisions ever to its weekly storage data. As many experts had expected, the association revised the 3 Bcf storage injection it reported last week for the week ending Aug. 10 to a 50 Bcf injection.

Despite decreased earnings from its wholesale operations and the impact of normal weather, Entergy Corp. indicated last Thursday that it is confident its second quarter 2001 earnings will be at least 5% higher than the current published First Call earnings consensus of $0.91 per share. The company attributed the strong results to “excellent performance” in its competitive businesses.

Despite decreased earnings from its wholesale operations and the impact of normal weather, Entergy Corp. indicated on Thursday that it is confident its second quarter 2001 earnings will be at least 5% higher than the current published First Call earnings consensus of $0.91 per share. The company attributed the strong results to “excellent performance” in its competitive businesses.