Triple

With wholesale gas prices for March and April nearly triple what prices were for the same months in 2002, there is very little that can be done to prevent some impact on utility customers. Despite forward purchasing, storage and other risk management practices, Mobile Gas in Alabama said its residential customers still will see a 22% increase in their rates.

For utilities and end-users still shell-shocked from the sky-high spikes of Monday and Tuesday, it may have seemed like re-entering a nightmare they thought they had already awakened from. Dollar-plus price gains — often plus much more than a dollar — were back in vogue Friday, as traders shrugged off the normal demand slump that accompanies a weekend and focused instead on a screen advance of more than 60 cents and prospects that this week largely will repeat the cold-weather pattern of the previous one.

Paced by triple-digit advances at Midwest and Northeast citygates and on Dominion in Appalachia and several Midcontinent pipes, nearly the entire cash market put in a strong weekend price performance in Friday’s super-volatile trading. Flat San Juan Basin numbers missed out on the price party, and other western points tended to see most of the smaller gains of less than 30 cents.

Triple-digit price dives on Dominion and in the Northeast Wednesday were arrayed against an overall mixed market in which few points strayed more than a nickel up or down from flat.

Triple-digit losses at Northeast citygates were the most spectacular in a day of general price plunges. Most non-Northeast points fell by anywhere from about 20 cents to 60 cents or so. Only Rockies/San Juan quotes saw flat to small declines.

Triple-digit gains at most of the Northeast citygates led an overall cash market advance Friday, as forecasts indicated little let-up this week in the severe winter conditions occupying much of the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. and Canada.

A triple hunting license — to increase delivery capacity, cast for customers and accelerate drilling — has been granted to the leaders of the next growth planned for natural gas production offshore of Nova Scotia, Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline (M&NP) and EnCana Corp.

A triple hunting license — to increase delivery capacity, cast for customers and accelerate drilling — has been granted to the leaders of the next growth planned for natural gas production offshore of Nova Scotia, Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline (M&NP) and EnCana Corp.

In a $334 million tax-free stock deal that will triple its gas reserves and double its daily production, Denver-based Westport Resources Corp. announced it will buy Belco Oil & Gas, a peer company similar in structure with mirror assets in the Rocky Mountains, Permian Basin, Gulf Coast region and the Midcontinent.