Plans

Carrizo Oil & Gas Inc. this year plans to spend $500 million on drilling and completions, with the lion’s share going to the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas. The Houston-based company said last week it would spend $385 million in the play, $70 million in the Marcellus Shale, $35 million in the Niobrara formation and $10 million for other drilling activity.

Canada’s BNK Petroleum Inc. announced Sunday that its subsidiary in the United States has so far seen “very encouraging results” from a test well in southern Oklahoma’s Tishomingo field, in the Ardmore Basin of the Woodford Shale.

Carrizo Oil & Gas Inc. plans to spend $500 million on drilling and completions this year, with the lion’s share going to the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas.

Xcel Energy Inc., which provides power generation to Colorado customers, plans to build a 21-mile transmission line (230-kV) in the Piceance Basin to serve anticipated natural gas-fired generation to enhance reliability on the Western Slope. A 1,100 MW gas-fired generator also is planned near Mesquite, NV, on 250 acres of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management. A unit of EWP Renewables Corp. has filed an application with Nevada regulators to construct the plant, which would come online in two 550 MW phases in 2016 and 2017.

QEP Resources Inc. plans to form a master limited partnership (MLP) to support the growth of its midstream business and expects to raise $300-400 million in gross proceeds by selling a minority interest in the MLP, the Denver-based exploration and production (E&P) company said.

The Senate Commerce Committee plans to hold a field hearing on pipeline safety in Charleston, WV, on Jan. 28 following a major natural gas pipeline explosion in the state in December.

J. Larry Nichols is retiring as an employee of Devon Energy Corp. effective Dec. 31. He plans to continue to serve as executive chairman and as a director. Nichols’ retirement follows a succession plan announced in June 2010, when Devon President John Richels was promoted to CEO, a post that Nichols had held since 1980. Nichols and his father, John Nichols, co-founded Devon in 1971; the company went public in 1988. Among the company milestones under J. Larry Nichols’ leadership, Devon in 2002 acquired Mitchell Energy & Development Corp., giving it the top position in what was then the emerging Barnett Shale, as well as access to the drilling technology pioneered by George Mitchell, which successfully combined horizontal drilling techniques with hydraulic fracturing well stimulation (see Daily GPI, Jan. 25, 2002; Aug. 15, 2001).

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it plans to investigate this week why no alarms went off when a 20-inch diameter Columbia Gas Transmission pipeline exploded Tuesday near the rural community of Sissonville, WV.

FERC Commissioner Tony Clark Thursday said he plans to spend much of his first tenure at the Commission focusing on manipulation and abuse in energy markets in order to create a more attractive investment climate for infrastructure developers.