Observers

After swallowing two energy distributors in two months mostobservers expected Energy East to enter a digestion phase, but thecompany came back for a third helping yesterday. The parent companyof New York State Electric and Gas said it is adding CTG Resources,Inc., parent of Connecticut Natural Gas (CNG), to its plate, whichalready is loaded with CMP Energy and Connecticut Energy.

Industry observers shouldn’t be surprised to see Texaco marchingto a different drummer in the industry’s high-stepping mergerparade, Texaco Chairman Peter I. Bijur said last week. Unlike manyof its peers, Texaco appears to be looking outside the upstreamindustry for a merger partner.

Texaco Chairman Peter I. Bijur said industry observers shouldn’tbe surprised to see Texaco marching to a different drummer in theindustry’s high-stepping merger parade

The longevity of the San Juan Basin never ceases to amaze mostindustry observers. Like the Denver Broncos’ John Elway, thewestern producing basin in New Mexico and Colorado just seems tokeep coming back each year to produce even more despite its age andthe endless predictions of its degeneration by its critics.

With storage levels already above 3 Tcf, few observers areexpecting the industry to have any trouble meeting gas demand earlythis winter. But the first quarter of next year, could provide amarket test not seen in the past two winters, several analystswarned last week. In its October Short-Term Energy Outlook, theEnergy Information Administration (EIA) seems to agree.

As several observers expected, cash prices started to retracetheir steps back down Thursday after having peaked the day before.Declines ranged from as little as a nickel to nearly 15 cents, butmost were in the neighborhood of a dime.

A supply/demand forecast released by Nova Corp. confirms whatmany market observers have expected: Canadian gas producers will behard pressed to fill all the new transportation capacity coming online this winter and could find it even harder to fill storage andmeet demand next summer.

A daily auction process to allocate pipeline transportationcapacity in the secondary market is the “linchpin” to removingprice caps for short-term transportation, FERC Commissioner LindaBreathitt said yesterday at the seventh annual DOE-NARUC NaturalGas Conference in Pittsburgh, PA. “Without market power mitigation,I am unwilling to release the price cap.”

State regulators shouldn’t force utilities to relinquish theirmerchant role in a competitive natural gas market, industry expertsagreed last week. Why bother? Given enough time, the market will dothat job for regulators, an energy supplier remarked.