Said

Southern Company Energy Marketing said it opened an energymarketing operation in Western Canada in conjunction with thesigning of an arrangement to manage the business of Pan-Alberta GasLtd. The new marketing operation has about 60 employees, most ofwhom previously worked for Pan-Alberta. Southern Company EnergyMarketing announced in January that it had agreed in principle tomanage the assets of Pan-Alberta, Canada’s second-largest exporterof natural gas. Southern has marketed about 7 Bcf/d, whilePan-Alberta has sold about 1.2 Bcf/d. Pan-Alberta is owned by morethan 400 Western Canada natural gas producers and has nearly US$1.5billion in sales annually. Its assets include long-term dedicatedgas supply arrangements and more than 1.2 Bcf/d of pipelinetransportation capacity.

Senate Energy Committee Chairman Frank Murkowski (R-AK) saidyesterday there will be a third mark-up session on electriccompetition legislation on June 7. About 30 amendments have beensubmitted for mark-up so far. “We will have staff work to pare downthe number of amendments, and I will meet personally with Sen.[Jeff] Bingaman and staff to come to grips with the concerns.”Bingaman (D-NM) is ranking minority member of the committee.Murkowski cited the extent of federal jurisdiction vs. statejurisdiction as the main difference among committee members.”Secondary issues are things like benefit funds, renewable mandatesand nuclear decommissioning…..” He urged committee members tocome to terms with the idea of a comprehensive electric bill,adding “I’m not going to be the one who kills a comprehensivebill.”

El Paso said a shutdown of the Blanco (NM) Plant starting June 5represents the largest annual outage on its system, impacting about15% of normal total throughput. There will be zero flow throughBlanco for about four hours on June 5. Thereafter the IMOITRKA (BRValverde) point can flow at its normal rate, but the net reductionof San Juan Basin capacity for the day will be 600 MMcf/d. Duringthe June 5-9 period maintenance on Blanco’s C and D plants will cutSan Juan capacity by 500 MMcf/d. A June 5-14 outage of the Gallup(NM) Station essentially will have no additional impact whileBlanco is down, but will result in a 250 MMcf/d San Juan cutbackJune 10-14. Combined pipeline and compressor maintenance betweenthe Leupp and Flagstaff Stations in Arizona will reduce NorthMainline capacity by 500 MMcf/d June 5, 400 MMcf/d June 6 and 210MMcf/d June 7. See the El Paso bulletin board for details of othermaintenance planned during June.

Citing “seasonal efficiency adjustments,” NOVA said it woulddecrease its target linepack by about 177 MMcf in gradualincrements by May 29.

El Paso Energy’s Petal Gas Storage said Friday it plans toproceed with the construction of a third salt cavern at itsexisting facilities in Mississippi based on the success of an openseason, which ended May 5. It noted it received service requests inexcess of the capacity proposed in the open season, and is now inthe process of evaluating the bids. The proposed expansion, ifapproved by FERC, would add 5 Bcf of working gas storage capacityto Petal’s existing storage facilities in Hattiesburg, MS, givingthe storage company a total of 15 Bcf of actual working gascapacity and 1.5 Bcf/d of withdrawal capacity.

Southern Company Energy Marketing said it sold 55.07 million MWhof electricity and 6.9 Bcf/d of gas in the first quarter of 2000,compared with 43.32 million MWh and 6.6 Bcf/d during the sameperiod in 1999. The marketing company, based in Atlanta, is jointlyowned by Southern Energy and Vastar Resources Inc.

Reporting that linepack was heavy on its south end, Northwestsaid Monday no on-system balancing and limited off-system balancingis being allowed in that segment.

Plans for the pipeline were announced last December (see NGI, Dec.27, 1999). Project completion is scheduled for third quarter 2001.

Trans-Union Pipeline L.P., a subsidiary of Panda Energy Intl.,said yesterday it has contracted Willbros Group, Inc. to build oneof the largest single-project pipelines in North America. Willbroswas hired to engineer and construct a 42-mile, 30-inch natural gaspipeline to supply at least 430,000 Dth/d of gas to a planned 2,700MW gas-fired facility in southern Arkansas. Willbros estimated thevalue of the construction contract at $30 million.