Whose

The electric industry is traveling down the highway ofrestructuring like a car whose every cylinder is misfiring. Thatmay sound pessimistic to some, but at least one industry watchersees much unevenness in how generation, transmission andlegislation are evolving and predicts a lot of uncertainty down theroad.

Texaco named John E. Bethancourt president-production operationsyesterday. Bethancourt, whose appointment is effective immediately,was most recently vice president – upstream corporate development.In his new role, Bethancourt will relocate to Texaco’s CorporateCenter in White Plains, NY. After joining Texaco upon the company’sacquisition of Getty Oil in 1984, Bethancourt was appointed areamanager-South Texas in Texaco U.S.A. producing operations. In 1996he was appointed vice president of international businessdevelopment in Texaco International Marketing and Manufacturing,and was named to his most recent assignment in November 1997.

Reliant Energy Gas Transmission, whose proposal to supplytransportation services to a mega gas-fired generation project wasspurned, is now rapping that very same power project, insistingthat there’s not enough demand to justify the project or thepipeline option that was selected to supply it with natural gas.

Reliant Energy Gas Transmission, whose proposal to supplytransportation services to a mega gas-fired generation project wasrejected, is now rapping that very same power project, insistingthat there’s not enough demand to justify the project or thepipeline option that was selected to supply it with natural gas.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission last week voted out twokey companion orders whose objective is to minimize the threat of arepeat of price spikes in the electricity market in the near termand beyond.

While technical conference participants hotly debated FERC’snatural gas transportation initiatives last week, there appeared tobe some areas of agreement – starting with the need for more timeto argue.

Nicor Inc., whose principal business includes Nicor Gas, andDynegy Inc., formerly NGC Corp., yesterday announced they haveformed a strategic alliance to jointly pursue wholesale generationand cogeneration power plants in six states in the Midwest.

Like a grizzly bear accidentally stepping on a porcupine, VikingVoyageur seems to have tread on a Wisconsin landowner whose husbandhappens to be a Noble Prize winning economist with a dislike ofpipeline infrastructure. In testimony filed at FERC on behalf ofhis wife Katherine D. Miller, Merton H. Miller, McCormickDistinguished Service Professor of Finance, Emeritus, of theGraduate School of Business, University of Chicago, warned theCommission if its goal in approving new pipelines is to benefitconsumers then it should toss the Voyageur project.