Took

A team of El Paso Natural Gas executives took the opportunityyesterday to explain in detail to their transportation customersthe pipeline’s new capacity-allocation proposal, but many left theFERC technical conference more bewildered than when they arrived.

Natural gas futures finished on a sour note Wednesday as tradersalleviated overbought conditions and took profits both before andafter the release of fresh storage data. After opening lower, theApril contract worked its way down throughout much of the sessionbefore tumbling at the closing bell to finish at $2.71. The promptmonth’s 8.9-cent decline was trumped only by the May contract,which dropped 9 cents to finish as $2.747. Estimated volume wasmodest with only 63,810 contracts changing hands.

In a move rumored for the past few months, Occidental Petroleum(Oxy) took Altura Energy off the hands of Shell Exploration &Production Co. and BP Amoco yesterday. The $3.6 billion transactionis expected to close within the next few weeks, the companies said.

The Southwest Gas merger soap opera took another turn recentlyas Oneok, the former merger partner of Southwest, announced it ispursuing lawsuits against the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC),the state of Arizona and specific members of the ACC staff fortheir roles in interfering with the merger. Oneok said it iswilling to settle its claims for $85 million.

The Southwest Gas merger soap opera took another turn recentlyas Oneok, the former merger partner of Southwest, announced it ispursuing lawsuits against the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC),the state of Arizona and specific members of the ACC staff fortheir roles in interfering with the merger. Oneok said it iswilling to settle its claims for $85 million.

Wisconsin Gas fired back at the latest ANR challenge to theGuardian Pipeline project to serve the Wisconsin market. The companytook issue with an ANR press release of last week (see Daily GPI, Feb. 15). The release challenged Guardianto release detailed information about its costs and rates and said theproject was not competitive with alternatives following a presentationto a state business group.

It was in like a lion and out like a lamb for March’s debut asthe spot month Friday as traders took the contract higher at theopening bell only to deliver it lower throughout the rest of thesession. March finished down 1.7 cents at $2.532.

While oil and gas companies took huge hits during the 19-monthenergy price crash between 1997 and early 1999, one silver liningwas the effectiveness of government incentive programs in assistingthe beleaguered industry, said the Interstate Oil and Gas CompactCommission (IOGCC). The findings were drawn from an IOGCC reportpublished last week titled Against the Wind: The Economic Impact ofIncentives during the Oil Price Collapse.

The 800-mile Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline took the stagelast week, but its supporting cast, the Sable Offshore EnergyProject, couldn’t make the show. After running the regulatory andpolitical gauntlet north of the border, the pipeline has been lefthanging by producers, who are more than a week away from initialdeliveries.