Rejecting

In the wake of a Wyoming court’s recent decision rejecting the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) restrictions on categorical exclusions (CX), an agency official told Congress Friday that it plans to undertake a formal rulemaking of the waiver of environmental reviews for certain onshore oil and natural gas drilling projects. House lawmakers also said they planned to petition the Department of Justice (DOJ) to appeal the court ruling.

In the wake of a Wyoming court’s recent decision rejecting the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) restrictions on categorical exclusions (CX), an agency official told Congress Friday that it plans to undertake a formal rulemaking of the waiver of environmental reviews for certain onshore oil and natural gas drilling projects. House lawmakers also said they planned to petition the Department of Justice (DOJ) to appeal the court ruling (see Daily GPI, Aug. 16).

Chevron Corp. CEO John Watson on Wednesday found himself face to face with some rambunctious activists who came to the annual shareholder meeting in San Ramon, CA, to voice their opposition to the oil major’s global drilling practices. In the end, however, the company’s majority shareholders won the day, turning back resolutions that included calling for more disclosure about hydraulic fracturing (hydrofracking).

Contrary to the Obama administration’s pledge to support new energy technology advancements, the Department of Energy (DOE) in late July sent out letters rejecting a majority of the proposals for federal funding in this area.

FERC Monday upheld a March order rejecting ANR Pipeline’s request to recover the costs associated with natural gas lost during Hurricane Ike via its annual fuel tracker mechanism.

After rejecting a $2.8 billion takeover proposal from Enterprise Products Partners LP in April, TEPPCO Partners LP said Monday it has agreed to merge with Enterprise to form the largest publicly traded energy partnership with an enterprise value of more than $26 billion. The stock deal is valued at about $3.3 billion and would create a company similar in size to Kinder Morgan.

Rejecting a final effort by state Republicans, Colorado Senate Democrats Tuesday affirmed the state’s revised natural gas and oil drilling regulations. The rules are scheduled to take effect beginning next week.

After rejecting a sale of the entire company to Electricite de France (EDF) in October in favor of a deal with MidAmerican Energy Holdings Co., the Constellation Energy board said it is willing to talk with the French company about its proposal to acquire Constellation nuclear assets. Constellation’s board has authorized discussions and an exchange of information with EDF related to an unsolicited proposal received from EDF on Dec. 2. Constellation said the decision to talk with EDF is consistent with its merger agreement with MidAmerican. The Constellation board has not changed its recommendation that shareholders vote in favor of the merger with MidAmerican. A special meeting for a vote remains scheduled for Dec. 23. EDF’s proposal provides for an up-front $1 billion cash investment in Constellation to be credited against the purchase price for EDF’s interest in the nuclear generation business, and an option under which Constellation could sell nonnuclear generation assets to EDF that have an aggregate value of up to $2 billion. The joint venture would run five of Constellation’s nuclear reactors, including the two at Nine Mile Point and the one at the Robert E. Ginna plant in New York, and the two at Calvert Cliffs in Maryland. Constellation and EDF are already in a 50-50 joint venture that was created in the summer of 2007 called UniStar Nuclear Energy LLC to develop new nuclear reactors in the U.S. using Areva SA’s Evolutionary Power Reactor design.

After rejecting a sale of the entire company to Electricite de France (EDF) in October in favor of a deal with MidAmerican Energy Holdings Co., the Constellation Energy board said Monday it is willing to talk with the French company about its proposal to acquire Constellation nuclear assets.