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Shareholders of both Duke Energy and Cinergy last week approved the merger of the two companies. Closing is expected as early as April.

New York-based Amerada Hess Corp. on Friday announced it will seek shareholder approval to change its name to Hess Corp. The revised name, said the company, is already “firmly established” in the company’s marketing and refining operations and recognized by customers where the company operates.

Westcoast reported experiencing “some souring issues” at the McMahon Gas Plant. The plant was at zero throughput as of early Friday afternoon but was in the process of ramping operations back up, the pipeline said. Customers were not asked to adjust their McMahon business, but “upstream customers will experience higher pressures as we recover from this event,” it added.

In some of the most explosive and combative testimony to date in the trial of Enron Corp. founder Kenneth Lay and ex-CEO Jeffrey Skilling, ex-CFO Andrew Fastow testified last week that Skilling used off-the-book partnerships to illegally revise earnings beginning in 1999, and told jurors that Lay not only knew about the financial shenanigans before the company dissolved into bankruptcy but also actively took part in deceiving shareholders and the news media.

A new report by Merrill Lynch highlights the wave of legislative proposals in Illinois, Maryland, Delaware and Connecticut prompted by rising utility rates due to the expiration of rate caps and higher power prices. Several proposals call for utility reregulation, while others would extend rate caps or place new limits on how much rates could rise in a year.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee overwhelmingly voted out bipartisan legislation last Wednesday that would make a significant amount of additional acreage in the natural gas-rich eastern Gulf of Mexico available for leasing. The bill, however, is expected to face stiff opposition from Florida’s senators and other Gulf Coast lawmakers when it comes before the full Senate.

Was it a case of “you can’t keep a good market down?” Following two days of mostly falling prices, which reflected the general bearishness of market influences, cash quotes for the weekend rallied at a majority of points Friday.

The Senate Budget Committee’s approval last Thursday of a provision authorizing drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) as part of the budget resolution for fiscal year 2007 has drawn the wrath of Democrats and Republicans alike. Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have threatened to vote against the budget package if ANWR remains.

April natural gas futures climbed in Friday morning trade to record a high for the week of $6.810 before easing off in the afternoon. The prompt-month contract ended up settling at $6.646, up 4.5 cents on the day and 14.4 cents lower than the previous week’s close.