Offshore

Just like a hurricane sends offshore rig crews to shore, atempest on the stock market can drive investors to the relativesafety of utility stocks. While many energy company stock pricesare buckling under the weight of the declining market, some utilitystocks are faring rather well, thank you. Duke Energy is anexample.

Westcoast Energy is leading an international consortium awardeda $250 million contract by Pemex Exploracion y Produccion (PEP) toconstruct and operate a 250 MMcf/d offshore gas compression andliquids recovery facility. The facility is to be located near theexisting Akal-GR platform in the Cantarell oil field in the Bay ofCampeche, Gulf of Mexico. The project will help to recover gas fordelivery into the Mexican national pipeline system, which is beingexpanded to meet the needs of new gas distribution concessions andpower generation plants.

Amoco plans to develop one of its largest gas discoveriesoffshore Trinidad and Tobago to serve future demand on the islandsand supply the Atlantic LNG export project in Trinidad.

Nautilus Pipeline offshore southeast Louisiana reported havingto shut down Sunday evening until further notice due to a largeslug of liquids being handled at the slug catcher. Nautilus toldshippers Monday they were released to flow to other systems “forthe next seven to 10 days.” Inquiries about the line’s recentvolumes were not answered Tuesday.

In the official launch of the $3 billion Sable Offshore EnergyProject (SOEP) in Halifax earlier this week, project owners raisedexpectations for gas reserves and production. “Our ongoingtechnical studies and interpretation of the 3-D seismic informationgathered in 1996 and 1997 show that the potential exists for morethan the 3.1 Tcf we estimated as the basis for our development planapplication,” said Mobil Oil Canada President Jerry Anderson. “Thegood news is that we might expect to recover more than 3.5 Tcf.This larger potential resource base will enable us to increaseinitial production rates to more than 500 MMcf/d, depending on suchfactors as markets, well performance and operating efficiency.” Theowners originally expected 460 MMcf/d. The additional production,however, will be within the facilities design capacity of 554MMcf/d, they said.