Windfall

Looking to capitalize on the United States’ recent windfall of vast supplies of natural gas, Excelerate Energy LP is moving forward with the development of the first floating liquefaction facility in the country utilizing its Floating Liquefaction Storage Offloading (FLSO) vessel technology. The Lavaca Bay liquefied natural gas (LNG) project will be located in Port Lavaca, situated between Galveston and Corpus Christi on the Texas Gulf Coast, and will be designed to export LNG to markets worldwide by 2017.

While the Senate successfully fought off Democratic efforts to levy a windfall profits tax on the earnings of major energy companies in the $60 billion tax reconciliation bill that was passed early Friday, lawmakers added nearly $5 billion to the tax burden of oil companies and repealed tax benefits that were approved in the energy bill in August.

The Republican-led Senate fended off a Democratic drive Thursday to levy a controversial windfall profits tax on the earnings of major energy companies as part of a $60 billion tax reconciliation package.

Dodging the controversial issue of a windfall profits tax, the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives settled for jawboning energy companies to invest in energy infrastructure by building more refining capacity and the Alaska natural gas pipeline.

Higher commodity prices, cost savings and mergers contributed toBP Amoco Plc’s $14.2 billion windfall year-end profits last year,which broke British profit records and were second only toU.S.-based rival Exxon Mobil Corp.’s $17 billion profit for 2000.BP’s profit in 1999 was $6.2 million.