Severe

Prices slumped Friday as the usual weekend lull in gas demandkicked in, and little severe heat was expected outside the southerntier of states. Western markets tended to see more of the largerdecreases, while a few eastern points managed to hang in there atflat leveles.

Problems with the Blanco Plant’s D1 turbine (see Daily GPI, June 8) were not as severe as anticipated,El Paso said, and thus it was being returned to service Friday alongwith the rest of the plant instead of remaining down through Sunday aspreviously estimated.

The Inspector General of the Department of Transportation (DOT)has found severe shortcomings in the inspection practices andtraining of federal pipeline inspectors at DOT’s Office of PipelineSafety (OPS), according to a preliminary report. The unfavorableDOT report comes in the wake of a number of legislative measures onCapitol Hill seeking to reauthorize the federal Pipeline SafetyAct.

The Inspector General of the Department of Transportation (DOT)has found severe shortcomings in the inspection practices andtraining of federal pipeline inspectors at DOT’s Office of PipelineSafety (OPS), according to a preliminary report. The unfavorableDOT report comes in the wake of a number of legislative measures onCapitol Hill seeking to reauthorize the Federal Pipeline SafetyAct.

Despite the arrival of another severe winter storm — this onein the Midcontinent — the majority of spot points leaned to thedownside Thursday.

Reliant is under a Critical Period operational alert due tosevere weather in the system’s market area. Effective today no SBSrate schedule storage withdrawals will be allowed until furthernotice.

While yesterday’s price weakness did not surprise many traders,the size of some of the declines exceeded expectations. Near recordhigh temperatures caused major drops in the Midcontinent, andforecasts of hot weather combined with a dropping futures screen toweaken the Northeast, Gulf Coast and western markets.

After prices nose-dived during September’s first three days oftrading, a number of traders thought they would never get back toindex levels during the month. Then after steady increases in theweek after Labor Day put quite a few points around or near indexesagain, there were those who said prices were likely to weaken butcertainly wouldn’t plunge to those early-September depths again.

As many had expected, prospects of severe heat averted much ofthe softness that normally accompanies a Fourth of July weekend,considered the year’s lowest demand period. But that was true onlyin eastern markets Friday. The bottom was dropping out for pricesin the West, particularly at the Southern California border.