NGI The Weekly Gas Market Report

Many market experts were stunned last week by the American Gas Association’s (AGA) report of a 3 Bcf net injection into the nation’s storage facilities during the week ending Aug. 10. An injection that small in August is unprecedented and had an immediate impact on prices, pushing near-month futures up 37 cents on Wednesday with a similar increase in cash Thursday morning. However, many marketers said they were attempting to ignore the data as an anomaly or an outright mistake by AGA or the storage companies it surveys.

Shell Exploration & Production (SEPCo) announced that it has begun oil and gas production from its 100%-owned Brutus tension leg platform (TLP) located in Green Canyon Block 158 in 2,985 feet of water in the Gulf of Mexico. Production began on Aug. 3 and is continuing to ramp up. The average daily production rate currently is about 25,000 barrels of oil and 35 MMcf of gas from the first well. A peak daily production rate of 100,000 barrels of oil and 150 MMcf of gas from the Brutus field is expected to be reached by the second quarter of 2002. Gross ultimate recovery is estimated at about 250 million boe.

Royal Dutch/Shell Group’s new Chairman Phil Watts, who assumed the post at the world’s second largest energy company July 1, said the company’s production goals through the rest of 2001 will be met, but admitted that its future expansion could slow because of the sagging world economy. Watts, who inherited a company that has been knocked back in several takeover attempts recently, nonetheless noted recently that natural gas “is plainly the fuel of the future and we are well placed to be part of that future.”

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El Paso Energy Partners has installed the new Prince Tension Leg Platform (TLP) facility in 1,450 feet of water on Ewing Bank Block 1003. The platform is located about 120 miles south of New Orleans and will gather and process oil and gas production from the Prince Field. It also will serve as a landing spot for future oil and gas developments in the Ewing Bank and Green Canyon areas of the deepwater trend.

Falcon Gas Storage Co. and its subsidiary, Hill-Lake Gas Storage LP, reported that the right-of-way acquisition has been completed for the construction of a new 17-mile, 20-inch diameter natural gas pipeline that would connect Falcon’s Hill-Lake gas storage facility with both Lone Star Pipeline Co.’s Line “X” and the El Paso/TXU Fuels North Texas Pipeline in Eastland County near Dallas/Fort. Worth.

IntercontinentalExchange (ICE), one of the fastest growing electronic commodity marketplaces, is going public with its daily natural gas and power price indices, making them available, free of charge, to anyone that registers at www.intercontinentalexchange.com. The company said its index history is also available.

Before leaving for recess, a House Resources subcommittee voted out legislation to the full committee that would rein in the president’s ability to prohibit oil and natural gas production and mining activities on public lands by declaring them as national monuments.

El Paso Energy Partners L.P.(EPN) is in the process of deciding among a number of opportunities for major new projects in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, following on its successful installation of the Prince Tension Leg Platform (TLP) last month in the Ewing Bank Block 1003 (see NGI, July 23), according to CEO Bob Phillips.