Shoot

Natural gas’ share of worldwide energy use will shoot up to 25% from its current level of about 20%, said Scott Nauman, gas marketing manager for the Americas at ExxonMobil, predicting that oil and natural gas will continue for the next 50 years to be the dominant fuels, with gas’ proportion growing as its annual growth rate outstrips both oil and coal.

Prices for natural gas and crude will shoot up in the short term, but the upward movement isn’t likely to be sustained for the longer term in the wake of last Tuesday’s terrorist attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center in New York and badly damaged the Pentagon near Washington D.C., according to Raymond James & Associates.

The Alberta Energy and Utilities Board dealt a blow to Shell Canada Ltd. by rejecting an application to drill a prime target that the company wanted badly enough to invest more than two years in seeking approval. The dramatic regulatory setback has left industry executives voicing hope that it was an isolated case and confirmed that the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers has been right to target access to drilling targets as a priority issue.

Alliance Pipeline informed its shippers last week that all debris has been cleared from the pipe, all connections are up and running, and that commercial service will begin on Dec. 1. Commercial service originally was expected to begin on Oct. 1 but was delayed several times because of commissioning problems (see NGI, Nov. 13).

Alliance Pipeline informed its shippers yesterday that all debrishas been cleared from the pipe, all connections are up and running,and that commercial service will begin on Dec. 1. Commercial serviceoriginally was expected to begin on Oct. 1 but was delayed severaltimes because of commissioning problems (see Daily GPI, Nov. 10).