Markets

Apache Corp., which has dedicated itself to pare debt and concentrate on its most profitable enterprises, is selling some dry natural gas-rich assets in Canada for $112 million.

While there is still much bullishness toward natural gas as a transportation fuel, industry leaders cast some doubts over its relative role in building demand for gas at LDC Gas Forum Mid-Continent in Chicago on Monday.

A reclassification of “base” gas to “working” and a cooler-than-expected August make for an end-of-injection season storage forecast that is 20 Bcf higher than the one issued last month in the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) Short Term Energy Outlook (STEO), the agency said Tuesday.

Freeport LNG Expansion LP has struck two binding 20-year liquefaction tolling agreements (LTA) for its proposed natural gas liquefaction and loading facility on Quintana Island near Freeport, TX. The separate agreements are with SK E&S LNG LLC (SK) and Toshiba Corp., each for a base quantity of 2.2. million tons per annum (mtpa).

Exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the United States are likely to total less than 10 Bcf/d even if the federal government grants permits to non-free trade agreement nations equaling higher volumes, according to analysts at Navigant Consulting’s energy practice. Market and engineering realities could temper the eventual volumes.

Top Canadian consumers are taking visions of liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports to Asia seriously enough to ask a question: What if terminal proposals for the northern Pacific Coast of British Columbia (BC) jump off industry drawing boards and go into action by landing overseas sales that have so far eluded them all?

Natural gas for delivery Friday rose a penny overall on average Thursday. Most traders elected to get their deals done ahead of the release of inventory data released by the Energy Information Administration (EIA), and weakness at eastern and Northeast points was countered by strength in California and firm quotes in the Gulf Coast and Midcontinent.

Apache Corp. late Thursday pulled off what many analysts had not thought probable, selling a one-third operational stake in strife-torn Egypt for $3.1 billion in cash to China’s Sinopec International Petroleum Exploration and Production Corp.

North America’s copious natural gas resources have led to a “competitive resurgence” driving low-cost ethylene production, but the growth has created challenges in the Middle East, where operators are facing the “opposite and unfamiliar challenge of ethane supply limitations,” according to IHS Chemical.