Daily GPI

Duke Energy, which is targeting its strategy in U.S. growthmarkets, has zeroed in on the right side of the U.S. map, expectingpower generation there to surpass the rest of the country. Thenatural gas giant expects Florida to grow at a rate of 4.5%annually, the Southeast and Texas to grow at 3%; and the East Coastand Upper Midwest to reach 2.5%.

Continued uncertainty surrounding the recovery of record highwholesale prices for electricity prompted the Fitch rating serviceTuesday to lower its rating outlook from “stable to negative” forCalifornia’s three major investor-owned electric utilities. Themove came in the midst of another week of late summer heatthroughout the state that is pushing up power prices and squeezingsupplies.

In what is a harbinger for other electricity-intensive high-techcorridors that have sprung up in various regions of the U. S., alocal zoning decision in the midst of California’s Silicon Valleycould decide the fate of a new generating plant that everyoneagrees is badly needed to serve the rapidly growing powerrequirements of the Internet-connected, new economy businesses.

El Paso Natural Gas issued an emergency notice Monday, reportingthat the Bondad 2A turbine must be taken down to repair an oil leaktoday. The work will reduce the capacity of the station by 95MMcf/d. El Paso also said Line 1200 and 1201 are being “SmartPigged” this week on Sept. 19, 21 and 24, causing a reduction of 40MMcf/d of San Juan Basin capacity. If you have questions, callMario Montes at (915) 496-2617.

Most of what was lost in spot market pricing on Monday wasrather quietly regained yesterday, as storage buying started tokick back in and the weather situation in the Gulf of Mexico onceagain looked ominous, with the possibility of another tropicalstorm or two developing.

Mark Twain once said that while everybody talks about theweather, nobody does anything about it. And although that may haveheld true on a 19th century Mississippi Riverboat, it was not thecase in the natural trading pit Tuesday as traders bid up pricesthroughout the session on the news two new tropical systems hadformed in the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea.

Communications projects are high on the list of announcementsand pronouncements at a Houston energy conference this week, withcompany executives telling analysts that the Internet, bandwidthand telecommunications may surpass traditional energy earnings inthe next decade.

In an effort to ease residential consumers’ deregulation growingpains, The Georgia Public Service Commission (GPSC) votedfive-to-none yesterday to approve an estimated $40 millionresidential refund plan, which would help ease what are sure to behigh gas bills this coming winter. The commission also voted toapprove a new sculptured tariff for distribution charges instead ofthe current flat rate by a vote of four-to-one, with CommissionerRobert Baker dissenting.

There’s little doubt that pipeline capacity between the RockyMountain region and the Midcontinent is about to experience asignificant upgrade. In all, three large projects have surfaced,including one formally announced this week by Colorado InterstateGas (CIG).