Brown Williams provides consulting services to all segments of the natural gas industry. We have consulted for natural gas pipelines, local gas distributors, marketing entities, producers, end users, government entities and trade organizations serving the gas industry. We have assisted clients to develop cross-border gas projects between the United States, Canada and Mexico and have testified on alternative infrastructure proposals in those jurisdictions. We have advised foreign governments on issues pertaining to pipeline regulation.

Beginning in the 1970s, the gas industry began an unprecedented series of changes that redefined industry roles, made natural gas pricing competitive and resulted in the unbundling of the services of interstate natural gas pipelines. At the state level, similar competitive changes occurred. Brown Williams has provided regulatory and financial assistance to its clients during every phase of the evolution of the natural gas market place from Order No. 436 to Order Nos. 636 and 637 to today’s Order No. 678, in which the FERC allows market based rates for qualifying storage facilities. Today, the industry confronts new challenges: filings for market based rates, unsubscribed capacity on existing pipelines, new Section 4 and 5 rate case proceedings, recovery of new pipeline safety costs, pipeline industry ownership structure, shortages of natural gas in traditional supply areas, the introduction of new LNG supplies with attendant impacts on gas quality and dislocations to existing infrastructure.

The new circumstances within the gas industry present both challenges and opportunities for nimble industry participants. Brown Williams can help you to secure those opportunities and to meet your challenges, both through its traditional regulatory and rate case services, but also with transactional services such as assistance in structuring gas and financial transactions or in developing new infrastructure projects. We have the personnel, tools and expertise to help you, whether your requirements are to assist by testifying in legal or regulatory forums, developing a cost recovery plan, evaluating cost of capital, advising you on how to structure an aspect of your accounting or the financing of your company, preparing a regulatory application or identifying the impacts of the regulatory principles that should be employed in the regulatory context you are evaluating.