Stepped

Robert J. Allison Jr., who joined Anadarko Petroleum Corp. 32 years ago and stepped into the chairman’s role 13 years later, will step down from his post Jan. 1, the company announced Thursday. As expected, CEO Jim Hackett will take over the additional role of chairman.

The only viable mitigation for the nation’s continuing high wholesale natural gas prices over the next two or three years is stepped up conservation, and FERC is now urging industry and regulatory leaders to push for more demand-side management, according to a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission staff director speaking Tuesday at the two-day “LDC Forum — Rockies & West” conference in Los Angeles.

Dynegy Inc. officially stepped out of the natural gas midstream business on Tuesday, with the $2.475 billion sale of its gas gathering, processing and liquids operations to Targa Resources Inc., a tightly held Houston-based midstream operator affiliated with private equity investor Warburg Pincus. Dynegy now plans to consider “every opportunity” for its remaining power generation business, the CEO said.

Salt Lake City-based Questar Corp. reports its Rocky Mountain exploration/production has stepped up substantially, compared with a year earlier, in the Pinedale (WY) Anticline, and it reaffirmed its guidance for E&P operations this year at 112-114 Bcfe. Questar made the announcement as part of an investor tour Tuesday of its Pinedale operations.

A political ally, the Northwest Territories government, has stepped forward to try restoring momentum to Canada’s faltering Arctic natural gas project. The territorial government is supporting the C$7 billion (US$5.6 billion) Mackenzie Gas Project so enthusiastically that it is taking a chance on angering one of its biggest constituencies, the Deh Cho aboriginal population along the southern 40% of the proposed Mackenzie Valley pipeline.

Aboriginal allies stepped forward last week to support the Mackenzie Gas Project, reviving hope that the C$7 billion (US$5.6 billion) natural gas development will find a way through the northern Canadian regulatory maze.

Aboriginal allies have stepped forward to support the Mackenzie Gas Project, reviving hope that the C$5 billion (US$3.75 billion) natural gas development will find a way through the northern Canadian regulatory maze.

President Bush believes stepped-up development of liquefied natural gas (LNG) capacity, as well as his administration’s efforts to reduce the backlog of drilling permits and provide incentives for development of offshore natural gas, will help satisfy in part expanding gas demand and offset escalating prices, according to an exclusive interview with the president in the July issue of the American Gas Association’s (AGA) American Gas magazine.

Although an old dry gas field dating back to the 1930s, Rio Vista has stepped up its 130-well production in Northern California over the past seven years since Calpine Corp. acquired the majority of producing wells in the 3,000-acre field. But the company now is running into belated resistance to further gas development of the state’s largest dry gas field, which is located near the small town of Rio Vista, CA.