Sell

Duke Energy Field Services has agreed to purchase percentageinterests in several non-regulated natural gas gathering systemsand processing plants from subsidiaries of ONEOK Inc., and hascommitted to build a natural gas processing plant with ONEOK insouthern Oklahoma.

Shenandoah Gas Co., a subsidiary of Washington Gas Light (WGL),agreed last week to sell its natural gas utility assets in WestVirginia to Mountaineer Gas Co. for an undisclosed sum. To ensurecontinued gas service in the area, Shenandoah Gas will providetransportation services through its Virginia pipeline toMountaineer Gas’ newly acquired pipe in West Virginia for sevenyears.

Duke Energy Field Services has agreed to purchase percentageinterests in several non-regulated natural gas gathering systemsand processing plants from subsidiaries of ONEOK Inc., and hascommitted to build a natural gas processing plant with ONEOK insouthern Oklahoma.

The New York Public Service Commission (PSC) approved New YorkState Electric and Gas Co.’s (NYSEG) sale of all of itsfossil-fueled generation plants to AES NY Inc. and Mission EnergyWestside Inc. The $1.85 billion sale furthers the commission goalof encouraging utility divestiture of generation facilities as onestep in the process of introducing competition to New York’selectric industry. NYSEG is the first utility in the state toreceive commission approval for the sale of generation facilities.

Nuevo Energy Co. agreed to sell its East Texas gas assets for$190.6 million to an affiliate of Samson Resources Co. The EastTexas assets accounted for about 275 Bcfe of Nuevo’s Jan. 1 provedreserves. The properties are long-lived reserves located mainly inthe Oak Hill Field and interests in the Carthage, SE Carthage andChapel Hill fields, as well as small interests and royaltyinterests in additional East Texas fields.

Spirit Energy 76, Unocal Corp.’s Lower 48 exploration andproduction unit reached a definitive agreement to sellsubstantially all of its oil and gas assets in Michigan to NewstarEnergy USA Inc. and Omimex Energy Inc. for about $37.25 million incash and 670,000 shares of stock in Newstar Resources, the parentcompany of Newstar Energy.

For the second Wednesday in a row, ebbing concerns of tropicalstorms and a “buy the rumor, sell the event” mentality has put themarket under selling pressure. In the wake of Hurricane Earl lastweek the October contract sank 13.4 cents. This Wednesday, themarket was already in the process of giving back some of Tuesday’sgains even before Tropical Depression number 6 became TropicalStorm Frances. That left the October contract down 4.1 cents tosettle at $1.833 yesterday.

Columbia Gas Transmission’s proposal to sell its Project Pennytransmission system in western New York and northwesternPennsylvania to Norse Pipeline LLC, which seeks to refunctionalizethe facilities as gathering, is a “thinly-veiled attempt todramatically increase” rates to move gas on the system atproducers’ expense, charged an independent producer.

Duke Energy Trading and Marketing formed an alliance withOrlando, FL-based Enviro-Check to sell gas and energy services tothe multi-family housing (MFH) industry. The agreement is a uniqueteaming of a major gas and power marketer with a conservation andsub-metering company.