Reports

Independent producers who took advantage of soaring gas and oilprices put in a blockbuster second quarter, according to thenumerous financial reports released yesterday. “Essentiallyeverybody beat my earnings forecasts,” said Irene Haas, E&Panalyst for Sanders Morris Harris in Houston.

As FERC last week was delivering bad news to the Northeast-boundIndependence Pipeline and associated SupplyLink and MarketLinkprojects, the Commission staff was delivering a report to CapitolHill that concluded new pipeline capacity may be needed for theregion within the next three to five years. It didn’t specify howmuch capacity though (See related story).

In response to customer requests, Transco has enhanced the LEADreports available in TRANSIT to show best available allocated databased upon a one-day lag for all shippers rather than a two-day lagas has been shown in the past.

Price points throughout the country varied in their responses toweather forecasts, the American Gas Association storage reportexpectations, and a rising futures screen yesterday. Despite thelack of direction, many traders agreed that weather, which wasresponsible for significant increases in the East and Midcontinentearlier in the week, is set to regain its leadership role in themarket, and push prices down heading into the weekend.

Despite a sharp increase in drilling activity recently,financial reports from 21 large producers, representing about 35%of total U.S. gas production, show a decline of 4% from last year’sthird quarter gas production and 3% from the first nine months of1998.

Despite a sharp increase in drilling activity recently,financial reports from 21 large producers, representing about 32%of total U.S. gas production, show a gas production decline of 4%from last year’s third quarter levels and 3% from the first ninemonths of 1998.

KN Energy cleaned house last week, starting with a corporate yard sale with tags on everything but the kitchen sink. It also continued the shake-up among top management that began with the sudden departure of former CEO Larry Hall last month when KN’s merger with Kinder Morgan was first announced (see NGI July 12).

KN Energy has been cleaning house and started a corporate yardsale yesterday with tags on everything but the kitchen sink.Although it wouldn’t estimate the total value of the assets beingsold, the list is long and encompasses properties and assets innearly every division of KN’s operations.

Columbia Propane named Donald F. Schalk president and CEO ofColumbia Petroleum Corp. He reports to A. Mason Brent, ColumbiaPropane president and CEO. Columbia Petroleum is a wholly ownedsubsidiary of Columbia Propane, an affiliate of Columbia EnergyGroup. Richland, PA-based Columbia Petroleum acquired the assets ofCarlos R. Leffler, Inc. and certain affiliates on May 11 andcurrently serves 36,000 customers in Pennsylvania, Delaware, NewJersey, Maryland, and Virginia. Schalk’s most recent position waspresident, retail services for Agway, Inc. in Syracuse, NY.