Positions

Aquila Inc. CEO Robert K. Green, who led the company’s entry into the energy merchant business, has resigned from all of his executive positions as well as the board of directors. Chairman Richard C. Green Jr., Aquila’s founder, chairman and Robert Green’s brother, has assumed the CEO duties. Since June, Aquila has reduced its workforce at its headquarters in Kansas City, as well as in Houston and London, and will return to its historic roots as an energy distribution network and generation business (see Daily GPI, Aug. 7).

Unocal Corp. said it will cut about 200 positions from its Gulf Coast region exploration and production operations, which will reduce its total work force by about 7%, as part of a restructuring operation designed to improve its overall cost structure and profitability and better position the unit for ongoing exploratory success. The program also is expected to include some asset sales in the region by the end of the year.

Melbourne, Australia-based BHP Billiton said last week that it is investing $100 million in two limited liability companies that will transport natural gas and oil from the group’s recently sanctioned Mad Dog development and its Atlantis discovery, both in the ultra-deepwater Gulf of Mexico (GOM). The company said the pipelines are part of a new system being built in the southern Green Canyon area that also will transport oil and gas from the BP-operated Holstein development and potentially other fields.

Melbourne, Australia-based BHP Billiton said earlier in the week that it is investing $100 million in two limited liability companies that will transport natural gas and oil from the group’s recently sanctioned Mad Dog development and its Atlantis discovery, both in the ultra-deepwater Gulf of Mexico (GOM). The company said the pipelines are part of a new system being built in the southern Green Canyon area that also will transport oil and gas from the BP-operated Holstein development and potentially other fields.

Dynegy Inc. said Wednesday that it has appointed Matt K. Schatzman, previously president of Energy Trading, to the positions of president and CEO of the company’s energy convergence business. In his new roles, Schatzman will add energy marketing and origination, commercial asset management, operations and development of Dynegy’s U.S. generation facilities, and Dynegy Canada to his current responsibilities, which include all energy transportation, logistics and risk management activities. He will continue to report to Steve Bergstrom, Dynegy Inc. president and COO. Schatzman joined Dynegy in 1990 as director of transportation after spending three years at Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp. Cliff Hare, formerly senior vice president of marketing and origination for the Southeast, will replace Schatzman as president of Energy Trading. After spending 10 years with Southern Natural Gas Co., Hare joined Natural Gas Clearinghouse, Dynegy’s predecessor company, in 1987 and has served in various departments within the company, including transportation, gas trading, power fuel and gas and power marketing. He will relocate to Dynegy’s Houston headquarters and will report to Schatzman.

Gasco Energy Inc. has appointed Michael Decker to the positions of COO and executive vice president. Decker has 24 years of oil and gas prospecting, mergers and acquisitions, development and operations experience. He is also chairman of the Potential Gas Committee, an independent group that provides estimates and reports on the nation’s long-range gas supply. Decker is the past vice president of exploitation with Prima Energy Corp., a Denver-based independent oil and gas company. Decker is also currently the owner and president of Black Diamond Energy, a geological engineering, operations, prospecting and merger and acquisition consulting firm. Gasco Energy is a Denver-based natural gas and oil exploration and development company that focuses in the Rocky Mountain area of the United States. The company currently holds interests in properties located in the Uinta Basin of northeastern Utah, which are being developed through an agreement with Phillips Petroleum.

Not all senior natural gas producers are staking out northern exploration positions in the belief that the Canadian Arctic’s turn has come for development. Talisman Energy Inc. — formerly an affiliate to one of Alaska’s top gas owners as BP Canada until the British parent company sold it on Canadian stock exchanges in the 1990s — is staying out of the Far North gas revival.

Not all senior natural gas producers are staking out northern exploration positions in the belief that the Canadian Arctic’s turn has come for development. Talisman Energy Inc. — formerly an affiliate to one of Alaska’s top gas owners as BP Canada until the British parent company sold it on Canadian stock exchanges in the 1990s — is staying out of the Far North gas revival.

In an effort to provide a more expansive period in whichparticipants can adjust their positions on evenings whenafter-hours Access trading is unavailable, the New York MercantileExchange will offer a 10-minute post-close trading session at theend of every week, with the same trading range that occurs duringthe day’s trading session, for its crude oil, heating oil, unleadedgasoline, and natural gas futures contracts.