utilities

Energy officials and utilities in California are looking at continued low retail natural gas prices going into and perhaps through the winter, according to state officials, and the current projections of Pacific Gas and Electric Co. How low the prices may be is not projected, but everyone seems confident that there will be no repeat of last winter’s record price spikes amidst the state’s supply and creditworthiness crises.

The California Public Utilities Commission last week unanimously approved a settlement agreement for San Diego Gas and Electric Co. regarding almost $600 million of unpaid wholesale power costs it has accumulated since mid-1999 through Feb. 7, 2001 when the state began buying wholesale electricity.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has indicated that it will work with natural gas utilities and pipelines to strengthen the industry’s infrastructure and enhance reliability through a $10 million program contained in a FY 2002 spending bill, the American Gas Association said last week. The group added that the bill is nearing final approval in Congress.

Over two-and-a-half years after the project was announced, Gulfstream Natural Gas System LLC reported that it has received FERC approval to commence mainline pipeline construction in Florida. With this approval, Gulfstream said it now has all major segments of its 753-mile pipeline project under construction and on schedule to deliver natural gas in June 2002.

Following months of negotiations that led to a settlement agreement in August, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU) has approved GPU Inc.’s merger with FirstEnergy Corp. Now all that stands in the way is an approval by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, after which the financial closing of the transaction would take place.

Southwest local distribution utilities and municipal distributors have called on FERC to reject, or convene a technical conference to consider, El Paso Natural Gas’ application to boost export capacity on the Samalayuca Lateral by about 100 MMcf/d to meet natural gas demand in northern Mexico. They argue that such action would deprive existing El Paso customers of already-tight capacity on the pipeline’s South Mainline.

Southwest local distribution utilities and municipal distributors have called on FERC to reject, or convene a technical conference to consider, El Paso Natural Gas’ application to boost export capacity on the Samalayuca Lateral by about 100 MMcf/d to meet natural gas demand in northern Mexico. They argue that such action would deprive existing El Paso customers of already-tight capacity on the pipeline’s South Mainline.

Xcel Energy Inc. on Monday filed a proposal with the Colorado Public Utilities Commission to reduce the natural gas component of its Colorado retail rates by $571 million a year. If approved, the gas cost adjustment would reduce the delivered price of gas by more than 40% beginning in October.

The Alberta Energy and Utilities Board (EUB) last week assumed the lead role to direct operations following the uncontrolled release Aug. 26 of storage cavern ethane and the resulting fire from two wellheads at BP Canada’s natural gas liquids plant near Fort Saskatchewan, AB. While there were no reported injuries, EUB said the incident is “impacting other petroleum operations within the province involving both upstream natural gas liquids production and downstream natural gas liquids product use.”