Station

Mirant Corp. reported last Wednesday that an explosion occurred at its 447 MW Lovett power station in Tompkins Cove, NY. The blast injured one employee and shut down the entire generating facility, according to spokeswoman Jamie Stephenson.

PG&E Gas Transmission-Northwest said scheduled Station 3 maintenance (see Daily GPI, April 23) is causing a greater restriction than anticipated. Starting with Thursday’s Intra-day 1 cycle and effective until further notice, Kingsgate capacity was further limited to 2,220 MMcf/d.

Citing “lack of supply from CMS Energy” (Panhandle Eastern) at the Gas City (IN) Compressor Station interconnect on the Lebanon Lateral, Texas Eastern said it restricted scheduled volumes there for Wednesday’s gas day. Should conditions at the meter remain unchanged, the restrictions will remain in place today, Texas Eastern said. However, a Panhandle Eastern spokesman said the shortfall resulted from customers in the frigid Upper Midwest taking extra supplies from the pipeline and causing a pressure drop at Gas City. The pressure was back to normal by Wednesday afternoon and the shortfall resolved, he said.

TECO Power Services (TPS), a subsidiary of TECO Energy, reportedTuesday it has completed the acquisition of American ElectricPower’s (AEP) Frontera Power Station near McAllen, TX for $265million. The plant – located about two miles from the Mexicanborder – is capable of selling power into ERCOT as well as theMexican power grid. The deal was originally announced last month(see Daily GPI, Feb. 12).

Florida Gas Transmission said a Zone 1 constraint resulting fromhydrostatic testing immediately downstream of Station 4 in MatagordaCounty, TX will be completed by Thursday and it is accepting all Zone1 nominations for that gas day. The maintenance period, which beganOct. 20, 2000 and was originally scheduled to end Dec. 1, 2000, wasextended several times (see Daily GPI, Jan.24).

Because El Paso’s Eunice Natural Gas Processing Plant justupstream of the TGT compressor station in Acadia, LA, is not fullyprocessing the gas stream available this winter (like others inSouth Louisiana), TGT said it is having operational problems due todownstream gas having excessive liquids. It notified customers thatgas received at any point, including points upstream of the EunicePlant, must not have a hydrocarbon dewpoint in excess of 10 degreesFahrenheit. Receipts not meeting that specification may be rejectedin whole or partially, TGT said.

MRT said a System Protection Warning will take effect today,primarily impacting services north of the Glendale (AR) Station. Italso will limit firm volumes to their primary direction of flow.

As of Wednesday until further notice, Northwest shippers withprimary corridor rights southbound through Kemmerer (WY) Station arerequired to flow up to 10% of their contract demand from receiptpoints north of Kemmerer. That represents a reduction from 25% thathad been in effect since Dec. 15 (see Daily GPI, Dec. 18).

Transwestern declared force majeure at its Gallup (NM)Compressor Station Tuesday after a unit went down during the nightdue to an electrical problem. San Juan Lateral capacity was reducedto 760,000 MMBtu/d. The pipeline replaced the electrical part andwill have the unit back in service for today’s gas day.