Transportation

Sonat declared a force majeure Friday for its 26-inch Main PassLine after taking the Olga (LA) Compressor Station off-line due toproblems with the liquids re-injection system. Olga capacity wasreduced to 430,000 dth/d, affecting 35 receipt points. The pipelineestimated it would take 10 days to restore full service at thestation.

Northern Natural Gas extended a System Underrun Limitation orderfor all market-area zones through Monday. The SUL was initiatedTuesday to guard against excessive linepack (see Daily GPI, June 30).

Adding to its long list of utility, marketing and transportationassets, Aquila Energy parent Utilicorp United entered into astrategic partnership with Quanta Services Wednesday for $400million. Utilicorp hopes to increase its profit potential in thederegulating electric and telecommunications markets by teamingwith the Houston-based Quanta, a provider of specialized servicesfor companies in those industries.

Northern Natural Gas had a System Underrun Limitation in effectTuesday for all market-area zones to guard against excessivelinepack.

Tennessee said Monday rehab work on the Sun Lateral in westernLouisiana will be completed ahead of schedule and it will resumetaking nominations at all Sun meters for Wednesday’s gas day. Thepipeline had earlier projected that the project would extend untilJuly 9 (see Daily GPI, June 22).

After beginning last week in the middle of a three-dayhigh-inventory OFO (see Daily GPI, June 22), Pacific Gas &Electric declared another one for Saturday after previously sayingit expected system linepack to remain well above the utility’starget through the weekend. The new order carried a positiveimbalance tolerance of 11% and penalties of $1/dth fornon-compliance.

The failure of a 7,000-horsepower motor has crippledTranswestern’s Bloomfield Compressor Station on the San JuanLateral, curtailing an estimated 100,000 MMbtu/d at 20 points. Thepipeline expects motor repairs to last until July 7.

Transwestern expects to complete maintenance Thursday on itsTopock Lateral that has been curtailing about 125 MMcf/d ofdeliveries to the PG&E interconnect at Topock, AZ, since June1. However, another phase of work on the lateral will begin Friday,reducing to zero deliveries at Topock to Mojave, SouthernCalifornia Gas and PG&E through June 30. About 400 MMcf/d willbe impacted by the second phase.

A high-inventory Stage 1 OFO implemented Sunday by Pacific Gas& Electric was continued through Monday and today. Sunday’s 15%imbalance tolerance was reduced to 6% Monday, but the noncompliancepenalty remains at $1/dth. PG&E projected that its linepackinventory would continue to be 200 MMcf or more above the utility’starget through Thursday.