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Gas prices shot to $5/MMBtu last Monday at the SouthernCalifornia border and PG&E Citygate, and hourly intra-daypeaking prices on the California Power Exchange spiked to $863/MWh.Day-ahead peaking power prices got as high as $470.

The optimists are turning out to be right as Canadian naturalgas exports to the United States continue to climb, laying to restpessimistic productivity forecasts a year ago.

It is becoming increasingly obvious that San Diego-based SempraEnergy is going to make a full-court press in its nonutilitybusiness units, seeking to get one-third of its earnings from thosebusinesses collectively in less than three years, according to itssoon-to-be CEO Steve Baum, the current president and COO. To hitthe earnings goal, Sempra’s nonutility businesses need to approach$275 million in collective profits, Baum told employees recently.

Less than one month after announcing the sale of its Cove PointLNG facilities to Williams for $150 million, Columbia already isputting more assets on the block. It has decided to sell ColumbiaPropane Corp. and Columbia Petroleum.

Some Capitol Hill lawmakers and energy experts believe theUnited States may be setting itself for another energy crisis 10 to20 years down the road by relying to heavily on natural gas to fuelnew power generation facilities.

After being an attractive takeover or merger target, the phonelines to Las Vegas-based Southwest Gas Corp. from prospectivesuitors are idle.

The Department of Energy (DOE) has opened a new Strategic Centerfor Natural Gas that will oversee a full range of the agency’sgas-related activities.

After a two-year delay because of computer snafus related tobilling, East Ohio Gas finally is preparing to join the state’s twoother major gas distribution companies in offering customer choiceacross its entire system. It also has agreed to stop sellingnatural gas entirely by 2004.

With June natural gas futures soaring to a dizzying high of$4.50 last week, projections by Lehman Brothers and Salomon SmithBarney that spot prices will average $3.50 the rest of the yearseem a bit too conservative. A few weeks ago, those price levelswould have seemed astronomical.