Release

In the wake of President Clinton’s release of crude oil from theStrategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to mitigate heating oil pricesthis winter, Chairman Frank Murkowski (R-AK) of the Senate Energyand Natural Resources Committee yesterday asked Energy SecretaryBill Richardson whether the administration had anything up itssleeve to reduce natural gas prices as the industry enters thewinter heating season.

After tumbling 5% on the release of a bearish storage reportWednesday, the natural gas market clawed its way back up yesterdayas locals were forced to cover shorts after watching stubbornsupport in the $3.90s hold yet again. With that buying pressure,the August contract finished 13.5 cents higher at $4.166, recoupingmore than half of Wednesday’s losses.

As if crashing oil prices, fresh weather forecasts and the release of storage data were not enough Wednesday, the natural gas futures market was rocked again Thursday by a report of a pipeline rupture in the Gulf of Mexico (see related story this issue). Although the accident has since been dubbed a non-event, it produced a dramatic, if brief, spike in prices as commercial traders loaded up on contracts only to dump them just minutes later.

FERC has granted Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line’s request forrehearing of the capacity-release and penalty issues related to itsproposed hourly firm transportation (HFT) service for gas-firedpower generation facilities.

FERC last week granted Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line’s request forrehearing of the capacity-release and penalty issues related to itsproposed hourly firm transportation (HFT) service for gas-firedpower generation facilities.

Attempting to better organize its businesses and release hiddenvalue in its operations, Western Resources said yesterday it willseparate its electric utility businesses under a differentcorporate umbrella from its non-electric affiliates. Both companieswill be public entities. The separation is expected occur through avoluntary exchange offer expected to be completed prior toyear-end.

FERC has granted Transcontinental Gas Pipeline a “temporary,limited term waiver” of its tariff to require advancecapacity-release offers and nominations for the first week of theYear 2000 by Dec. 27 and 28, respectively. The waiver would extendthrough Jan. 7, Transco said, and would only be used in the eventof an unanticipated systems failure or other Y2K-related problems.

In the wake of last year’s oil bust, energy industry lenders arestill keeping a tighter grip on their money. However indicationsare banks and others are looking for places to put capital in theenergy patch.

A day after the release of an agreement with the state of NewHampshire last week that settled numerous electric restructuringissues, Northern Utilities announced it was buying back YankeeEnergy for $679 million after a 10-year separation originallyordered by the Securities and Exchange Commission.