Service

Tony Clark, former chairman of the North Dakota Public Service Commission (PSC), has been sworn in to fill a Republican seat at FERC.

Tony Clark, former chairman of the North Dakota Public Service Commission (PSC), has been sworn in to fill a Republican seat at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (see NGI, May 28). Clark is to serve out the balance of the term ending June 2016 that was vacated by former Commissioner Marc Spitzer. Clark, who was tapped by President Obama in February to fill the vacant seat at FERC, had served on the PSC since 2000. He is the immediate past president of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and served in the North Dakota House of Representatives from 1994 to 1997.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) said Wednesday the dunes sagebrush lizard (DSL) does not need to be listed on the Endangered Species Act after New Mexico and Texas voluntarily agreed to protect the animal’s habitat.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) said Wednesday the dunes sagebrush lizard (DSL) does not need to be listed on the Endangered Species Act after New Mexico and Texas voluntarily agreed to protect the animal’s habitat.

Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services (S&P) has cut the corporate credit rating of Fort Worth, TX-based FTS International Services LLC, one of the top five hydraulic fracturing (fracking) service providers in North America, because it said capacity additions and rising costs, combined with moderating demand and low natural gas prices, are pressuring margins in the fracture stimulation industry.

A proposed 16-inch diameter, 450-mile oil pipeline from North Dakota’s Bakken Shale to a hub near Clearbrook, MN, is at risk for delay or termination due to a stalemate with Enbridge Energy Partners LP, which is refusing to allow an interconnection with its pipeline in Minnesota, according to High Prairie Pipeline, which has filed a complaint at FERC.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission gave Southern Natural Gas Co. the green Light to begin service on the Phase III leg of its South System Expansion III project, which will provide up to 375,000 Dth/d of firm capacity for Southern Company Services Inc. to serve affiliate Georgia Power Co.’s proposed expansion of its Plant Jack McDonough electric generation facilities near Atlanta. The Phase III portion of the expansion included construction of a a 2.4-mile, 36-inch diameter Bay Springs Loop paralleling Southern’s main system in Clarke County, MS; construction of a 5.2-mile Gallion Loop in Hall and Perry counties in Alabama; abandonment and replacement of 11.7 miles of 16-inch diameter pipeline with 42-inch diameter pipeline in Elmore County, AL; and installation of a 7,000 hp electric motor unit at its existing Ellerslie Compressor Station in Harris County, GA.

Equitrans LP has informed FERC that it accidentally spilled hundreds of gallons of drilling mud and chemicals into a creek in southwest Pennsylvania in April while building a Marcellus Shale pipeline.

The U.S. shale gas boom has put pressure on the natural gas industry nationally to upgrade and build new pipeline capacity to service what are anticipated to be growing markets for gas-fired electric generation and use of gas as a transportation fuel, the CEO at Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) Tony Earley said Monday in advance of the PG&E annual shareholders meeting in San Francisco.