Steadily

While gas production in the Midcontinent region has been declining steadily over the last decade and is projected to drop another 3.5% this year, there has been a surprising increase in the pace of drilling and a renewed interest in exploration and development, said Energy and Environmental Analysis Inc. (EEA) in its Monthly Gas Update.

After rising steadily for much of the session, the natural gas futures market tumbled lower in the last 30 minutes of trading Tuesday as locals rang the register and took profits for the day. At just 45,969, volume was light enough for their selling to make a difference and the October contract closed at $4.661, down 2.4 cents for the session and a dime off its earlier high.

Gas futures extended Monday’s gains on Tuesday as market participants covered short positions and also responded to the Northeast heat and Tropical Storm Claudette in the central Caribbean. The National Hurricane Center upgraded what had been a tropical wave directly to a tropical storm on Tuesday. The August futures contract ended the day up 12.2 cents to $5.503, not far from its daily high, but opinions were mixed on the market’s direction for the remainder of the week.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has been steadily moving away from light-handed regulation “to the other end of the spectrum with much heavier regulation. This is reflective of the public distrust of the energy market,” Carl Levander, vice president of NiSource’s Columbia pipelines, told attendees at the LDC Forum last week.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has been steadily moving way from light-handed regulation “to the other end of the spectrum with much heavier regulation. This is reflective of the public distrust of the energy market,” Carl Levander, vice president of NiSource’s Columbia pipelines, told attendees at the LDC Forum earlier this week.

The liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry has grown steadily for at least 30 years, but the latest trends point to a major expansion in trade, especially in the Atlantic Basin, according to a recent report by a Standard & Poor’s (S&P) analyst.

The liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry has grown steadily for at least 30 years, but the latest trends point to a major expansion in trade, especially in the Atlantic Basin, according to a report issued Friday by a Standard & Poor’s (S&P) analyst.

A week-long period of steadily rising prices at nearly all points, including a few spikes along the way, came to an end Tuesday. Prices tended to range from either side of flat at San Juan Basin and Pacific Northwest points to loosing 30-40 cents or so at Northeast citygates. Many points in the Gulf Coast and Midcontinent/Midwest fell between 20 and 30 cents, or approximately the same amounts by which they had risen the day before.

Houston-based Dynegy Corp.’s stock continued to steadily fall Monday despite the company’s move to shore up its balance sheet in the wake of the downgrade in its bond rating last week by Moody’s Investment Service to one notch above junk.