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Although many of its nations have so far spurned their own shale development, European chemical and energy service companies are benefiting from the U.S. shale gas development and the resulting low natural gas prices on this side of the Pond, according to an American Chemistry Council (ACC) economist.

With a new president taking the reins of power for a six-year term and the rest of North America undergoing an energy transformation, the time is right for Mexico to use its deep energy resources to become a fully developed nation over the next two decades, a Mexico City economic consultant and former federal official told a Manhattan Institute forum on Monday.

Results from recent U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS) water quality testing in U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) monitoring wells in Pavillion, WY, “raise serious questions about the adequacy of EPA practices in drilling monitoring wells and testing water samples,” said Erik Milito, American Petroleum Institute (API) upstream director.

Forecasting increasing natural gas prices through the rest of this year, energy analysts at Raymond James said Monday their estimates indicate natural gas-fired power generation added 6 Bcf/d of demand year over year through May this year.

With one of the state’s two major nuclear power plants expected to stay out of service for at least the rest of this year, California officials Friday showed a reemphasis on natural gas-fired generation, which is the state’s major source of electricity. They gathered in Northern California to officially open a new 300 MW gas-fired plant, the Lodi Energy Center (LEC), touting it as the state’s cleanest and most efficient combined-cycle gas plant.

While the potential is widely recognized, a shale boom in Mexico akin to the rest of North America is unlikely any time soon, an analyst with the Houston office of Wood Mackenzie told NGI.

The surge of U.S. shale gas supplies has caused a large-scale rethink on liquefied natural gas (LNG) and the relationship of the U.S. gas market to that of the rest of the world. Those who used to watch U.S. shores for inbound tankers now wonder how soon and how many tankers will leave this country loaded with liquefied shale gas.

Continued large gains at New England citygates went against the overall grain of flat to lower prices in nearly all of the rest of the market Thursday. An early taste of winter-like conditions was still hanging around from the Rockies through the Midwest and Northeast, but the cold was due to start fading going into the weekend even as a cold front was about to bring cool temperatures into the previously moderate South.

The United States is the undisputed leader in the development of unconventional natural gas resources. However, much of the rest of the world is on to the shale gas promise and will soon be exploiting its reserves, according to a new analysis by Douglas-Westwood.