Saturday

Transwestern extended through at least Saturday the force majeureassociated with a freight train derailment near its mainline innorthwest new Mexico (see Daily GPI, Nov. 2). The derailed cars have beenremoved but harsh weather delayed the start of pipe inspection untilFriday, a spokeswoman said. Crews were hoping to restore servicebetween Stations 5 and 6 Sunday, she said. A capacity constraintremained in effect going into the weekend, but it had been reducedfrom 400,000 MMBtu/d to 300,000 MMBtu/d.

Pacific Gas & Electric did not extend a systemwidehigh-inventory OFO (see Daily GPI, Oct. 23) beyond Saturday.

Pacific Gas & Electric expanded Friday’s customer-specific OFO(see Daily GPI, Oct. 20) into asystemwide Stage 2 high-inventory OFO Saturday with $1/Dth penaltiesfor positive daily imbalances exceeding a 5% tolerance.

Sonat lifted Saturday an OFO Type 1 and force majeure associatedwith a shut-in test of its Bear Creek (LA) Storage Facility. BearCreek’s injection/withdrawal capacity was restored to 100%.

Sonat notified shippers Saturday that nine groups on its SouthGeorgia system would be under an OFO Type 22 effective Monday untilfurther notice. Cold weather and projected demand on the systemwere cited as reasons for the OFO.

El Paso Natural Gas declared an Unauthorized Overpull Penaltysituation Sunday following an explosion Saturday morning on its1100 Line on the suction side of the Pecos River Station south ofCarlsbad, NM (see related stories in this issue). The OFO wasextended through Monday and will remain effective until furthernotice. Washington Ranch Storage Field, downstream of the rupture,was experiencing maximum withdrawals, the pipeline said. AffiliateEl Paso Field Services shut in its Carlsbad gathering system untilfurther notice because EPNG was physically unable to acceptreceipts there.

Michigan Gov. John Engler did as expected on Saturday, signinginto law an electric deregulation utility package which mandates animmediate 5% rate cut for residential customers and gives thestate’s Public Service Commission (PSC) additional authority toensure competition exists for electric services.

Both of California’s two major distributors, Southern CaliforniaGas and Pacific Gas & Electric, had high-pack OFOs in placeSaturday. The one by SoCal Gas applied to all shippers whilePG&E’s was customer-specific.

Florida Gas Transmission began unplanned maintenance Saturday atCompressor Station 7.5 in Port Barre, LA. It is expected to lastthrough May 8 and is limiting upstream volumes to 875 MMcf/d.