Spotlight

If you’ve gotten the feeling that someone is watching you, you’re not paranoid. The spotlight is on natural gas prices and the lights are only going to get brighter.

If you’ve gotten the feeling that someone is watching you, you’re not paranoid. The spotlight is on natural gas prices and the lights are only going to get brighter.

Not wilting under the public spotlight so far but faced with heightened public criticism from state elected officials, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) tried hard last week to stand its ground on information about its power trading in late 2000 that on the surface appears to contradict testimony the utility’s representatives gave under oath to legislators in May.

Within days after Enron Corp. filed the largest bankruptcy in history, the focus of the seemingly never-ending financial nightmare shifted last week from the company’s headquarters in Houston, TX, and Wall Street to the political epicenter in Washington DC, with lawmakers on Capitol Hill quickly scheduling hearings to find out “how this happened” and the Department of Labor opening an investigation into the possible mishandling of retirement funds of Enron employees. This action comes on top of the ongoing investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) into the embattled energy trader.

The spotlight quickly shifted Friday from the sharp prices declines, which were due to reduced weekend demand and milder weather, to the American Gas Association’s announcement that it will stop publishing its weekly natural gas storage statistics at the end of the year.

More than the California governor’s “usual suspects” appear in the list of top 20 power sellers to the state during the first five months of this year when average spot prices went from $321/MWh in January to $271/MWh in May, according to pricing information released Monday by the state Department of Water Resources (DWR). Average overall prices–spot and long term–paid by DWR went from $316/MWh in January to $243/MWh in May.

Natural Gas Vehicles (NGV) appear to be making another push into the spotlight as Westport Innovations Inc. and BC Gas Inc. reported last Thursday that their BCG eFuels Inc. joint venture has merged with Seal Beach, CA-based Pickens Fuel Corp. (PFC) to form the largest natural gas fuels provider for NGVs in North America.

Natural Gas Vehicles (NGV) appear to be making another push into the spotlight as Westport Innovations Inc. and BC Gas Inc. reported on Thursday that their BCG eFuels Inc. joint venture has merged with Seal Beach, CA-based Pickens Fuel Corp. (PFC) to form the largest natural gas fuels provider for NGVs in North America.

The cure and the illness in California’s electricity crisisshared the spotlight Wednesday as the state finished its whirlwind27-hour, sealed-bid power auction and the state’s third majorinvestor-owned utility appealed to state regulators for a five-yearsurcharge and a $100 million cash-conservation program to avoid thefinancial torpor of its two larger fellows private-sectorutilities.