Pool

Looking to pool resources on certain proposed natural gas and oil projects, Chevron Neftegaz Inc., an affiliate of ChevronTexaco, and Russian super major Gazprom announced Wednesday the signing of a six-month binding memorandum of understanding that will allow the two companies to jointly undertake project feasibility studies in Russia and the United States.

With a spring shut-in test of the Bridgeport Storage Pool in West Virginia continuing through Monday, Dominion said that thus far it has managed to conduct the test without backing off any production. “However, the warm weather predicted for the weekend might necessitate backing off some production,” the pipeline said Thursday. “This could affect production in Bubbles 4202, 4203 and 4205, as well as production in Tucker County, the Greer Field and production behind the station at Peoria.” Dominion field personnel will notify producers if any shut-ins are necessary.

Seeking to shield regulated companies from cash-hungry parent corporations, FERC on Wednesday issued a final rule that requires regulated natural gas and oil pipelines and public utilities who participate in intra-corporate cash management pools with their parents and affiliates to submit written agreements to the agency for scrutiny.

CenterPoint (formerly Reliant) issued an Operational Alert to notify all shippers and pool managers that with storage levels nearing maximum capacity, as of Thursday’s gas day they must avoid long imbalances. Otherwise, “such imbalances can exacerbate [CenterPoint’s] current operational problems and may result in the future assessment of Excess Contract Quantities penalties or the issuance of OFOs.”

Texas Eastern restricted all deliveries Friday to the Transco Ragley interconnect in its West Louisiana pool, saying the pressure differential between the two pipelines did not “accommodate deliveries to Transco’s system.” The condition was expected to continue through Monday (Nov. 18).

FERC last Wednesday gave its stamp of approval to the lion’s share of a proposal made by New England Power Pool (NEPOOL) and ISO New England that will set up a standard market design (SMD) for the New England region and, more broadly, help to standardize regional wholesale power markets both across the northeast and the rest of the United States.

Less than a week after the company announced it was acquiring a natural gas processing plant, Calgary-based Cavell Energy Corp. said Tuesday that it has finalized plans to build its first gas plant in the Shackleton area of southwest Saskatchewan. According to the company’s plans, the initial phase of the plant will have a capacity of 5.5 MMcf/d, with room for expansion.

The New England Power Pool (NEPOOL) is asking FERC to allow it to change the treatment of installed capability (ICAP) transactions in order to make it easier to trade ICAP and firm energy products across control area boundaries. NEPOOL said that its proposed market rule revisions represent a significant step in facilitating inter-control area trading of ICAP, while also focusing on New England’s largest export market, New York.

The New England Power Pool (NEPOOL) has filed an energy conservation program with FERC that is designed to encourage reduced consumption of electricity during peak demand periods and help moderate price fluctuations in the wholesale electricity market. The program could reduce the daily energy requirement in the region by 300-600 MW and produce annual savings of $30 million.