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Shell Oil Co., the U.S. subsidiary of Royal Dutch/Shell Group, has named Gus Noojin president and CEO of Shell U.S. Gas and Power LLC. Noojin will be responsible for Shell’s natural gas interests in gas transmission, liquefied natural gas and natural gas liquids. He was previously responsible for Shell’s acquisition of the downstream assets of Texaco Inc. in the United States. Noojin replaces Curtis Frasier, who has transferred to Royal Dutch/Shell headquarters in The Hague to become general counsel for Shell International Exploration and Production.

Oneok announced it has sold its remaining equity interest in Magnum Hunter Resources Inc., an independent producer based in Irving, TX. The interest sold by Oneok represented 4.9 million shares of Magnum Hunter common stock. “Our decision to sell is not a reflection on Magnum Hunter,” said Oneok CEO David Kyle. “Strategically it is time for us to divest our interest. The $35.8 million proceeds from this sale will be used to reduce Oneok’s outstanding commercial paper.” Oneok’s energy marketing and trading operations provide service to customers in 28 states. The company is also the largest natural gas distributor in Kansas and Oklahoma, operating as Kansas Gas Service and Oklahoma Natural Gas, serving 1.4 million customers.

Severe weather early Tuesday morning caused an unscheduled outage at Sonat‘s Pavo Compressor Station on the South Georgia facilities. Repairs were completed that afternoon. No incremental IT was scheduled during the intraday 2 cycle for Tuesday downstream of the Albany (GA) Compressor Station; the pipeline was evaluating system conditions to determine whether or not IT would be scheduled during the timely and evening cycles for Wednesday’s gas day.

ANR said Saturday it has begun cleanup and damage repairs at its Patterson Liquid Terminal facilities in St. Mary Parish, LA, where a fire had broken out Friday. Affected producers/operators injecting condensate into ANR’s system upstream of Patterson were notified of the force majeure event, and due to joint efforts between them and the pipeline, scheduled nominations were not affected, ANR said. As of Saturday it expected repair work to take four to five days, but in a Monday bulletin board update, ANR anticipated that critical Patterson operations will be restored Tuesday. Facilities were being brought back into service throughout Monday, and ANR was working with upstream interests to gradually bring on physical flows.

If early reports are confirmed, the irony will not be lost on energy-starved Californians. Yesterday, Tri-Valley Oil & Gas Co. (TVOG) reported it might have found the West’s largest natural gas field ever near Delano, CA, estimating it holds 3 Tcf in reserves. TVOG said its Sunrise Natural Gas Project might be one of the largest onshore finds in more than half a century.

Much of the post-weekend market ranged from flat to as much as a dime higher Monday. After a late May that was spent largely following the lead of energy futures, cash found little guidance at Nymex from modest upticks in gas and mild softening of the crude oil and heating oil contracts. Instead, physical traders looked to growing heat across the southern half of the U.S. to help push most points a few cents higher.

For the third-straight session, natural gas futures rebounded in somewhat lackluster fashion, after bears were unable to influence a move below underlying support. The modest buying seen Monday was enough to lift the July contract 2.5 cents higher to $3.242, its highest settle since last Wednesday.

In what is increasingly becoming a war of words between the media and energy companies, Williams Cos. executives went on the offensive before a story appeared Sunday in The New York Times, disputing allegations that the company attempted to corner the power market in California in December 2000. Williams followed up with an hour-long conference call Monday morning, when top executives further clarified the company’s energy trading strategies, and its overall business model.

In what appears to be the second tragic death to occur in the post-Enron, scandal-plagued energy industry in four months, Charles Dana Rice, senior vice president and treasurer of energy giant El Paso Corp., was found dead Sunday afternoon of an “apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound” at his home in the upscale River Oaks section of Houston, according to authorities.