• FEATURE STORY:  Gas price sets record; now over $14/mmbtu

• COMPETE has grown to 104 members just since July

• Amerada Hess glad to get First Energy gas customers

COMPETE has grown to 104
members just since July

The COMPETE Coalition impressed us by gaining 68 members in less than five months (RT, 7/26).
     Now we learn that it's added nearly 40 more members since July.
     COMPETE now has 104 members supporting its broad promotion of the benefits of markets.
     "We're pretty pleased with our progress," said Joel Malina, who runs COMPETE. He considers the best thing about COMPETE's membership is "diversity."
     He reports members including generators, grid owners such as Reliant, Constellation, EPSA, National Grid, Wal-Mart, 7-Eleven and Federated Department Stores, America's largest department store chain.

Amerada Hess glad to get First
Energy gas customers

Buying First Energy Solutions has significantly boosted Amerada Hess' gas sales in Ohio, John Gartman tells us.
     He's senior vice president for energy marketing at what has grown to be a major oil company with extensive exploration and production around the world.
     But he came to Amerada Hess from Public Service Electric & Gas in 1997 to build the company from an oil marketer into a total energy supplier in the company's C&I footprint from Raleigh to Boston and west to Ohio selling gas and power.
     The firm hasn't bought growth on the electric side but is adding organic growth.
     He didn't want to talk much about numbers but generalized that power and gas have grown about 35% last year. On the gas side he's looking for acquisitions.

Select Energy really likes
Maryland's marketplace

Maryland “is one of the most attractive retail electric markets in the US,” said Stephen Fabiani.
     He’s vice president, retail sales and marketing at Select Energy (Northeast Utilities), a major regional power and gas marketer.
     The largest C&Is, Type III (600 kw or higher), went on hourly-priced standard service, Fabiani told an Eastern retailers meeting hosted by the Maryland Retailers Assn.
     Maryland splits SOS services into four groups -- residential, Type I non-residential (less than 60 kw), Type II (61-600 kw) and Type III -- each with different rules.

How to save $15 billion?
Let the market speak out

Consumers in the Eastern Interconnect saved $15.1 billion over five years thanks to production efficiencies driven by wholesale power competition.
     That’s what Global Energy Advisors (formerly Henwood) found when it quantified savings produced since Order 888 opened the door to merchant generation in 1999.
     You may remember that as Henwood, the firm declared the end of the California crisis and got it right.
     The study was funded by 10 EPSA members -- BP Energy, Constellation Energy, Exelon, Mirant, NRG Energy, PSEG Power, Reliant Energy, Shell Trading Gas & Power, Suez Energy and Williams.