Rolls

Though downgraded to a Category Three hurricane and still well out to sea, Hurricane Bill could regain Category Four status on Friday as it rolls over warmer ocean waters and on towards Bermuda, the National Weather Service’s National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Thursday.

Lawyers for the Western States Wholesale Natural Gas Antitrust Litigation published a legal notice Monday seeking to swell their plaintiffs’ rolls with commercial/industrial customers who bought natural gas during 1999 through 2002 for electric generation or for resale. A proposed $11.3 million settlement is pending with at least six of the defendants, subject to a fairness hearing Sept. 5 before a federal judge in Las Vegas, NV.

Supplies from the Canadian Arctic will be the Rolls-Royce of the North American market with higher costs than even tanker cargoes of liquefied natural gas from overseas, the National Energy Board has been told.

FERC Chairman Pat Wood announced Thursday that the Commission’s auditing divisions have been consolidated within the Office of Market Oversight and Investigations (OMOI).

A Palo Alto, CA-based non-profit, private energy-related research firm last week rolled out a public-education campaign aimed at raising $100 billion over a 10-year period to upgrade major electric transmission and distribution facilities, and to introduce technological changes to bring the power network in touch with the 21st Century.

Looking to beef up efforts to acquire or develop assets as part of the company’s strategic growth plan, AGL Resources Inc. has created a new business development unit, Pivotal Energy Development. The new business entity will report to Kevin P. Madden, executive vice president of distribution and pipeline operations for AGL.

Kinder Morgan’s Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America (NGPL) has announced it has extended a number of firm transportation natural gas agreements with We Energies, formerly Wisconsin Electric Power Co.

In an effort to allow trading firms to automatically submit trades for confirmation regardless of execution means or proprietary data formats, IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) last week unveiled its web-enabled eConfirm, an electronic trade confirmation service for global energy and metals markets.

There’s good news and then there’s better news. For Houston-based Kinder Morgan Inc. (KMI), every day just seems to be a front-page top-of-the-fold story. Take Wednesday, for instance. Delivering on projections made earlier this month that it would meet or beat consensus earnings estimates, KMI reported great news, with a 107% boost in second quarter earnings over the same period a year ago, and year-to-date earnings up 42%. However, KMI’s general limited partner Kinder Morgan Energy Partners L.P. (KMP) almost trumped the broadcast, with its announcement that it would buy a 2,600-mile Texas natural gas pipeline system for $360 million and split its stock two for one.