Natural Gas

The Obama administration has approved a new natural gas drilling project in Utah that is designed to support more than 4,000 jobs and boost the production of energy -- while protecting the environment. All are political issues in the current presidential election year. U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced the approval on Tuesday during an appearance outside Salt Lake City. Texas-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp. will be allowed to develop up to 3,675 natural gas wells in the next decade in Uintah County, about 170 miles southeast of Salt Lake City near the Colorado border.

An Orange County taxi company has become the first in California to put new compressed natural gas-powered Ford Transit Connect Taxis into service. California Yellow Cab of Orange County said Thursday that it started using the first 10 of 50 Ford CNG-powered taxis it plans to put on the road by 2012. Yellow Cab of Anaheim has ordered 69 of the vehicles. The CNG taxis are already in use in Chicago, Las Vegas, New York and St. Louis. They cost about $35,000. The taxis are based on the gasoline-powered version of the Transit Connect, a small van popular as a delivery or commercial vehicle.

Iran announced a $3.2-billion natural gas deal with China on Saturday, a move that underscored the difficulty of using economic sanctions to pressure Tehran to bow to Washington's demands on its nuclear program. Iranian state television quoted a senior government official as saying the deal with a Chinese consortium, announced two days after the Obama administration renewed U.S. sanctions against the Islamic Republic, would eventually include an unnamed European country as a partner.

More than 40 homes and the Saticoy County Club were without heat and hot water after a high-pressure natural gas line snapped under a landslide near Saticoy on Sunday morning. The 8:55 a.m. rupture, which sent dirt and debris hundreds of feet into the air for nearly an hour, was Ventura County's third gas-main break caused by a landslide in the past three weeks. "It is inconvenient for our customers, and it's costly for us," said Vic Sterling, Southern California Gas Co.'

Beneath the ocean floor just off the Carolina coast, there's enough natural gas to meet the nation's needs for 105 years at current consumption levels, scientists report. Only one problem: Nobody knows how to recover the stuff. The methane within Blake ridge is contained in tiny bubbles and as a solid called methane hydrate. The solid, a combination of methane and water, is maintained by low temperature and high pressure. When brought to the surface, it fizzes as methane escapes.

Exxon Mobil Corp.'s purchase of a Texas natural gas producer for $29 billion could reshape the U.S. energy landscape, setting the stage for the fuel to challenge coal in the nation's electrical grid and helping to alleviate American dependence on foreign oil. The wager by the nation's largest oil company positions Exxon Mobil to thrive in a world where petroleum, its key product, is getting tougher to come by. The deal is a "game-changer" that...

With no end in sight for rising gasoline prices, cars and trucks that run on compressed natural gas — fuel that's about half the cost of gasoline — are getting another look. Los Angeles commercial real estate broker Ted Simpson recently snapped up a Honda that runs on CNG, which in the U.S. has been better known for powering public transit buses and delivery trucks. "I did not want to be hostage to what I believe will be rapidly escalating oil and gasoline prices," said Simpson, who drives hundreds of miles a week, covering a territory that ranges from San Diego in the south to Santa Barbara in the north.

JERUSALEM - Amid the collapse of a multibillion-dollar natural gas agreement between Egypt and Israel that had been in place since 2005, officials from both countries stressed Monday that the dispute was a commercial one and did not reflect political tensions. But observers viewed the contract spat as the latest sign of souring relations between the two countries and said it could threaten the long-term viability of their historic 1979 Camp David peace accord. Tensions between the two countries have been rising since the ouster last year of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who maintained close ties with Israel despite the relationship's unpopularity with the Egyptian public.

Natural gas will be an increasingly important product to Chevron Corp. and other energy companies, a top executive said Wednesday. But George Kirkland, who will take over next year as the company's vice chairman, said it would take considerable investment -- even in the recession -- for firms to take advantage of natural gas' potential as a lower-emissions fuel. "The fact is, natural gas has come of age," Kirkland said in a speech at the World Gas Conference in Buenos Aires.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission said Williams Cos. would pay $20 million to settle charges that it attempted to manipulate natural gas prices. The settlement covers Williams' natural gas trading from January 2000 through June 2002, the commission said. The agreement settles charges of attempted manipulation and false reporting of natural gas trades to index publishers by Williams and its marketing and trading arm, the trading commission said. From Reuters