Weary

Gas producers who’ve grown weary of low commodity prices might wish their molecules were electrons as the latter form of energy can fetch a better price. After having crunched the numbers at the behest and expense of a gas producer, a small engineering firm believes it can make economic sense to turn gas into power right in the producing field.

Gas producers who’ve grown weary of low commodity prices might wish their molecules were electrons as the latter form of energy can fetch a better price. After having crunched the numbers at the behest and expense of a gas producer, a small engineering firm believes it can make economic sense to turn gas into power right in the producing field.

Fort Worth, TX-area residents who’ve grown weary of Barnett Shale gas drilling commotion in their backyards might want to move near one of the nation’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) regasification terminals for a little peace and quiet. Gas-rich resource plays are booming; U.S. LNG regas terminals, not so much.

Like a weary traveller who comes home to gracefully pass on, the November contract moved quietly sideways and lower in expiration-day trading Wednesday as traders contemplated a market that had fallen perilously close to new one-year prompt-month lows after having soared during the month of October.

Bulls and bears took turns yesterday in the gas pit at Nymex as light buying pressure throughout the morning morphed subtly into selling interest in the afternoon. As a result, prices did not stray very far from center with most months able to eke out minimal advances for the session. The July contract finished at $3.747, which was 1.3 cents higher on the day.

Growing weary of waiting, BP Amoco and Atlantic Richfield Co. hope to step up the pace of their ongoing merger procedures by restarting the required 20-day notice period, suspended Nov. 2, at the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The companies concede the FTC has concerns about their pairing, but the merger partners said they don’t agree with the issues raised by the commission.

Tossing aside an ongoing state regulatory investigation of someof its billing practices, California’s most aggressive independentenergy service provider (ESP), Commonwealth Energy, plans to moveinto Pennsylvania and New Jersey next month where it expects a morestraightforward and receptive marketplace for its residential andsmall business electricity products. While signing up more than60,000 customers in California’s daunting retail mass power marketsso far, Commonwealth has been able to pass on savings of up to fivepercent, emphasizing green power from environmentally benignsources, developing prospects for new green products and shoppingfor power generation operations of its own, in addition to eyeingother states as the next stage of its two-year-old development.